Donor

Draco owled the same message every other night for two weeks, announcing his arrival in an hour’s time unless her floo barred him from entering. She left it open. So, every other night, they fell asleep on her couch and woke up in her bed. She was still unsure of how he moved her without waking her, but that particular mystery ranked rather low on her priority list of things that needed to be solved.

It had been a Draco night when she accidentally fell asleep at her office desk signing paperwork after a long day of healing. A group of Aurors fell into a trap and she had spent hours tediously piecing them all back together. Literally.

So when the door to her office flew open and hit the wall with a loud thud, she was on her feet, wand raised ready to defend herself, with a piece of parchment stuck to her hair and her robes falling off one shoulder.

Draco was pristinely put together as always but underneath the polished suit and perfectly styled hair he looked positively wild. His eyes were frantic as he scanned her over.

“Do you have any idea…” he started, paused, swallowed, inhaled, exhaled. He extended his hand in front of him.  “Come.”

Hermione lowered her wand.

“I am not a dog, Malfoy.” She bit out, voice heavy with sleep, accompanied with annoyance pouring through her words from the fright he had just given her along with the dehumanizing order he had issued.

She sank back into her chair, blinking a few times in an attempt to orient herself, plucking the paper from her tresses and putting it in one of the many piles on her desk.

“Granger, I have just spent the last three hours searching for you. I do not have the energy nor the patience to debate semantics.” He took a few steps in her direction and once again reached out for her. The command silent this time.

“I have more paperwork to finish before I can come down-,”

“Hermione.” His voice was sharp but her name falling from his lips was as close to a whine as Draco Malfoy would probably ever get.

She looked up from her work, the hard line of his mouth and crystalized grey eyes seemed angry. But if she looked hard enough, which she did, she could see the desperation hidden there. It melted her resolve.

Giving each stack of paper a tap, she stood and rounded her desk while they filed themselves away. The urge to be a brat and ignore his hand was tempting. Alas, he had done nothing to deserve her following that impulse and she was beyond tired, so she placed her hand in his and let him lead her down the back hallway to where the veiled stairway to her home was located.

“Should I ask how you found the door?”

“No.”

“I’m going to have to redo my wards, aren’t I?”

“Yes.”

He led her to the bedroom where he dropped her hand, entered the bathroom where he braced himself on the counter and hung his head for a few minutes before turning on the tap and splashing water on his face.

Hermione quickly changed into her night clothes and got into bed. He came back into the room and got to work removing his shoes, pants, and dress shirt with flicks of his wand before climbing in behind her and burying his face into the back of her neck.

“Are you going to tell me what happened?”

The arm around her tightened.

“Your floo was locked, which was… fine,” his last word sounded forced, “but then you didn’t answer mine or my mother’s owl. Went to the Leaky, Hannah said she hadn’t seen you in hours.” He pulled her impossibly closer. “Flint caught me as I was leaving and made a concerning comment. You weren’t here when I got through your wards, so I went to Potter and Weasley. Both of whom were no help despite their wives’ concern. Luckily for me, Theo is quite infatuated with your nurse and refuses to sleep anywhere she isn’t. She suggested I try your office but the Ministry entrance was closed.”

“You went to Harry and Ron?” She asked incredulously, spinning in his hold to face him.

“Yes.” The sighed word that escaped him was a tortured one. “It has been a rather long evening so if you wouldn’t mind, I would like to sleep now.”

Hermione remained soundless for a few moments. Her brain, however, was anything but quiet.

In the two weeks that they had been sleeping together, without the implied meaning that usually came from the phrase, Hermione had unexpectedly grown sexually and emotionally frustrated with the man in front of her. They barely spoke apart from the quick greeting and goodbye accompanying his respective entrance and exit from her flat. And, Godric, the way he held and touched her throughout the night was beyond maddening.

As if he heard her thoughts, the thumb attached to the hand currently located on her hip started painting small brush stokes low on her abdomen, dangerously close to the place that had begun begging for his touch days ago. Any and all drowsiness extinguished.

“What was it exactly that made you panic?” She whispered as she gently brushed the hair back from his forehead the way she knew he liked.

“Malfoys don’t panic, Granger. We find solutions to our problems.”

That was not what she was yearning to hear. The very small part of her conscious that usually cautioned her against provoking him evaporated.

“Problems… like possibly losing the blood source that keeps you alive or was it no longer having a monopoly over me and my time?”

His eyes sprung open and pinned her with a heated scowl that screamed anger, real Draco Malfoy anger.

“Is this your opinion of me then?” The muscle in his jaw ticked.

Her hand fell away from his face as she shrugged. This conversation had been pushing the boundaries of being overdue, and while she was feeling slightly guilty for upsetting him, she was still desperate to understand the motive behind his recent ‘indulgent’ behavior towards her and she would prefer to have it before he needed her blood again. Before she fell deeper into the all-consuming hole that Draco Malfoy had become.

Was she just one of the many extraordinary things that the Malfoy family collected and possessed? Maybe the reason they had made it to this point was just because she gave her attention and affection away too liberally. Something she had learned with Ron and Viktor and a muggle man she had briefly dated. Or perhaps his ‘indulging’ was his way of lessening the debt he thought he owed her for continually keeping him alive. But what she absolutely refused to assume without confirmation, was that he also desired what she had grown to crave.

More.

Draco shoved away from her, sitting on the side of the bed and giving her his bare back.

“Funny,” his arctic tone had her tensing, “I wasn’t aware I could commandeer someone’s life while simultaneously becoming a villain for receiving what they gave me no choice in accepting.”

“Sorry for saving your life?”

He shot to his feet and spun to face her.

“No, you don’t get to accuse me being a shit person and then turn around and use your life decisions against me!” He seethed. “Gods you’re all the same, aren’t you?”

“What are you talking about?” She snapped, her dormant anger rearing its ugly head. She hated being compared to other people, especially when it clearly came with a negative implication.

“You wanna know why I have always kept my distance from people and maintain a small circle, Granger? Hmm?” He gave her no time to answer as the question was rhetorical. “Every single person I have ever attempted to get close to finds some way to manipulate me. Hell, even my own fucking parents are guilty of it.” He laughed but it was humorless. “I don’t know why I let myself believe you were capable of being any different.”

The disgust in his voice made her stomach lurch.

“Draco,” Hermione started, his name soft as she tried to put this conversation in reverse. She hadn’t thought this through and had let her insecurities get the best of her.

“I panicked when I couldn’t find you,” his voice was eerily calm now, he rounded the bed and towered over her, “Because I couldn’t fathom losing the one person who finally made me feel anything other than numbness.”

His cruel face splintered for just a second as he watched a single tear run down her cheek. It was the similar to the expression he’d wear whenever he needed her but refused to say as much. And then it was gone.

“Something I’ll make sure to never allow again.”

Crack.

He was gone before his sentence even sank in.

Hermione ran to her floo, calling out for Malfoy Manor. She ignored the fact that she was in her pajamas and was being a hypocrite by arriving uninvited and unannounced.

She was deposited into the foyer and frowned when she realized she had no idea where he would be... He had always come to her. Not to mention, she tried to black out the previous time she had been here and did not retain any of the rooms she might have been in apart from one.

“Ms. Granger!” Narcissa called as she swept into the room wearing a beautiful matching night gown and robe. “Tula woke me and said you had arrived rather hastily without notice. Is it Draco? Has something happened?”

“Narcissa, I am so sorry for the intrusion... Especially at this hour. Nothing is wrong, Draco and I... we had an argument and he left rather suddenly. I was hoping to finish our conversation.”

“Oh good, he finally told you.”

“Told me what?”

“About his research… the possible cure…” Narcissa trailed off as she read Hermione’s face. “He hasn’t told you, has he?”

“Clearly not as I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“That foolish boy.” His mother exhaled.

“I’m going to assume you either cannot or will not tell me without his consent?”

The woman in front of her pulled her robe tighter around herself and answered with a nod.

“Lovely, are you able to point me in his direction then?”

“He doesn’t live here, not yet anyway, not until he is married and ready to fulfill his duty as Head of the Malfoy Family.”

Hermione frowned, “Then I am doubly sorry for the impromptu visit. I was under the impression that he lived here.”

“He stays here sometimes, as he did when he was recovering so that I may keep an eye on him, however, his current primary residence is a flat in London.” She motioned to the fireplace she came from, “Call out for Draco Malfoy, this floo has unrestricted access to his.”

She positioned herself and grabbed a handful of the powder from the elegant cone to the side of her.

“Hermione,” Narcissa spoke before she could activate the magic that would take her to Draco, “While I don’t agree with him withholding this information from you, I would like to request that you keep an open mind on his intention and reasoning for doing so.”

“With all due respect, Mrs. Malfoy, I’ve already had a lifetime of people’s intentions when it comes to my existence. I prefer to form my own opinions and make my own decisions.”

She received a nod in acknowledgment and then she was calling for Draco Malfoy.

Hermione landed in what appeared to be the exact opposite of her living room. Where hers was colorful and warm with welcoming furniture that promised comfort, this room was gloomy and sterile. Dark hardwood floors met white walls that housed stiff furniture appearing as though it had never been used. She almost laughed at the absurdity of the contrast between the two. Like oil and vinegar, exactly how she and Draco were.

Voices echoing from down the hallway to her left pulled her focus away from the décor.

“I told you not to trust her.” A female snipped, and when she received no response, she carried on. “I told you she would betray you.”

She carefully placed one barefoot in front of the other, praying to everything holy that the floorboards wouldn’t creak and give her away.

“Pansy… please.” Draco begged dully.

Pansy.

Something very similar to jealousy ignited in her. Every muscle in her body clenched and her body temperature rose. She made it to the doorway at the end of the hall, the doorway to a bedroom, most likely his, and saw him facing a set of floor to ceiling balcony windows while Pansy stood a pace behind and looking at his back.

“How much time do you have before it happens again?”

Hermione watched as he shrugged his shoulders. “A few days. Maybe.”

“It’s happening faster then?”

His response came in a slight tip of his head.

“There has to be another way.”

“Pansy, we’ve been over this.” Draco drawled. “Theo confirmed it this morning. It must be her.”

“He barely confirmed anything, Draco! Did he even attempt to see if it worked with someone else? Did you even ask?”

“Pansy.”

The girl visibly softened; Hermione bristled as she watched the other witch place her hand on him.

“All I’m asking is that you try… You could attempt with me…”

Her ability to remain in the shadows ended.

“Attempt what exactly?”