Roman Holiday

Chapter Five

Hermione had to admit it: she was enjoying herself. Giulia had said she’d feel like a new person after Micaela got through with her, and it was true. The shocked look on Snape’s face this afternoon had been enough to feed her feminine ego all the way through puberty.

And Malfoy! She slanted a glance through to where he was sitting on the sofa. When had HE ever had anything nice to say to her?

You look … amazing. She smiled to herself.

This girl power was heavy stuff.

Malfoy wasn’t sentimental, though - he’d been surprised, sure, but now he was pulling himself together. By the time she walked back out with their drinks, he’d regained a certain amount of equilibrium. “Thanks,” he said. He took a sip of his soda, grimacing at the unfamiliar fizz, and scanned the room thoughtfully. “Are you renting this place?”

Hermione didn’t blame him for being puzzled. The flat was pure Giulia - quirky, loud, a bit mismatched, but nevertheless compelling. An excellent example was the sofa Malfoy was sitting on, which was covered in fire-engine-red chenille and resembled nothing so much as a giant pair of lips.

“Borrowed,” she said. “Belongs to my cousin. She skipped town with her boyfriend and paid me off so I wouldn’t tell my parents.”

The same look of shock that she’d gotten from Snape. “You’re here by yourself?”

“Hello, pot? Kettle calling.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Okay, Malfoy, spill. Why exactly ARE you here?”

He bought some time by taking another sip of his soda. She was all set for him to come out with some bullshit line about seeing the world when he gave a little self-derisive puff of a laugh, set down his glass, and shrugged helplessly.

“Bored,” he said. “That’s it, mainly. You wouldn’t believe how tedious my summers are.”

She raised her eyebrows. “I’m supposed to believe that? You’re bored, so you came looking for me?”

“It’s the truth.”

“Malfoy. Look.”

“Draco,” he said. Hermione rolled her eyes.

“Okay. Draco. First of all. Are you bipolar or something? Are you off your medication? Because this isn’t making sense.” She leaned forward in her chair. “You’re the most prejudiced person I know,” she said. “You’re perfectly at home in the wizarding world, and you hate Muggles. Why on earth would you go to all the trouble of finding Muggle clothes, changing gold into Muggle money - you must have made a stop at Gringotts, for God’s sake! - just to come hang out with me, someone you don’t like and never have, in a city infested with millions of people that you despise?”

“Um …”

She kept going. “And why me? Where are all your friends this summer? Couldn’t you just have sent an owl to Crabbe or Goyle or Millicent or Pansy and said, hi, it’s me, I’m sick of my parents and coming to visit, watch the fireplace?”

He shrugged. “That never occurred to me.”

“Oh, and it DID occur to you that I was hanging out in Rome? Dear me, Hermione Granger and I are SUCH good friends, I must look her up?” She frowned at him. “And how did you get my address, anyway?”

“Called your mother.”

“You -“ She gaped at him.

**

THAT shut her up, Draco thought with satisfaction. About time the conversation started going his way.

She had better legs than he’d imagined, but she was still a shrew.

Face it, he told himself. She has better EVERYTHING than you imagined.

“Look, I’m not exactly sure why I’m here,” he said. “To be perfectly honest, I’d rather not examine it too closely. I told my father I was here to spy on you. To see if you knew anything about where Potter was.”

Hermione blinked. “It’s no secret where Harry spends his summers,” she said, guarded. Draco shrugged.

“Maybe not to you,” he said, “or Weasley. But my father has a million contacts at the Registry, including one who has access to student records. And Potter’s name doesn’t even show UP on them.”

“You aren’t going to get any information from me,” she said coolly. He rolled his eyes.

“I know that … why else would I have told you?” He crunched an ice cube thoughtfully. “Look, I don’t know about you, but I haven’t eaten since this morning. Any chance there’s a house-elf around this place?”

At that, she laughed, a merry sound of genuine amusement. “Keep being funny, and I may let you hang around.” She wiped her eyes. “No house-elf. But when I said I was paid off?” She rubbed her fingers together meaningfully. “I’m rolling in it. Let’s go out to dinner.”

**

She took him to a fragrant little bistro three blocks away that smelled like a kind of heaven he’d never visited before. There were other people waiting around in the foyer, but Hermione waved at one of the waiters and a moment later they were seated at a little white-draped table near the back.

The waiter’s name was Stefano. “Friend of Giulia’s,” Hermione explained. “You like Italian food?”

Draco eyed the menu. “Mm,” he said noncommittally. His mother was quite fond of a little Tuscan place, wizard-run of course. Quite exclusive. He found it to be much like any other expensive restaurant - small portions, exquisite presentation, soft chamber music, invisible elf-service.

It was okay. He wasn’t sure it would have much in common with this bright, noisy room full of chatter and clattering dishes and the smell of garlic and olive oil. He sipped the fizzy water Hermione had ordered for them and looked around, fascinated. Laughter, gesticulation, people talking with their mouth full. Stefano grabbed another waiter and did a quick tango step between two tables, to cheers and applause. He ended up, panting, at their table, and raised his eyebrows enquiringly.

Hermione hadn’t even opened her menu. “What’s the special?” she asked. Stefano grinned.

“For everybody else, the chicken Piccata. But that’s because Vincenzo, he bought too much chicken on Monday. For you? Leave it to me, I’ll bring you the good stuff.”

“Okay,” Hermione said. “Draco? You okay with that?”

The menu was in Italian, which was maddeningly close to Latin but not close enough for him to actually read. He looked up from it and nodded. “Fine.”

Stefano kissed his fingertips and winked at Hermione. “Don’t you worry, cara. I’ll set you up.”

“The good stuff” turned out to be beefsteak tomatoes layered with creamy mozzarella and basil leaves, veal medallions with rosemary potatoes and grilled asparagus, and crusty golden rolls that steamed when broken open. Draco had to admit that it had his mother’s trendy Tuscan place beat all to hell.

“Keep eating like that and you’re going to split your seams,” he told Hermione, who was tearing apart another roll. She just fluttered her eyelashes at him, drizzled the bread with olive oil from a decanter on the table, and bit in.

“Not to worry,” she said, after she’d swallowed. “We’re going to work it all off later. Don’t order dessert, though - there’s this other place I want to show you.”

**

She took him dancing.

He was a cool customer, she thought, studying him sideways under her lashes as they walked into the club. Didn’t give anything away, not even when she thumb-wrestled with the bouncer.

That Marcello. He was a sweetheart.

The club, though - that had him going, and with good reason. Euro-pop with a house beat, blasting so loud you could hear it down the block. Three different dance floors in three different rooms. Neon lights. Disco balls. Fog machines. Next-to-naked dancers, both male and female, voguing on cleverly lit pedestals.

The main dance floor was jammed. Not enough room for Barbie and Ken, let alone two life-sized bodies. She grabbed Draco’s hand and pulled him through an arched doorway to the right. Better. Crowded, but not too.

The music was so loud that Draco could feel the bass tremble from the woofers vibrating up through the floorboards into his feet. All around him were bodies, sweating shaking gyrating Muggle bodies, in a hallucinogenic mass of drum-pad insanity.

And Hermione. Hermione, still in those pick-me-up-and-fuck-me-hard boots, paired with a floral dress that would have been sweet, were it larger than an Ace bandage. Somewhere between the coffee and the check, he’d given up trying to connect the Hermione Granger he knew with the one across the table from him. Now, he was just dealing with the feel of her body, rubbing rhythmic and tight against his.

The beat was in his brain, and she was in his blood. The dance floor was so crowded that they weren’t dancing so much as swaying in place. She twined her arms around his neck, and he felt a sudden jolt of satisfaction flood through him.

Whatever he could possibly have been doing back in Switzerland, this was indescribably superior.

**

“You don’t really have a hotel reservation, do you?” she asked. They were walking back to the Piazza del Spagna, hand in hand. She felt Draco stiffen at the question.

“Why would you think that?”

“That’s easy,” she said. “To make a hotel reservation over the telephone, you’d have needed to give them a credit card number.”

“How do you know I didn’t?”

“Just answer the question, Malfoy,” she said. “Do you have a bloody reservation, or not?”

He hesitated. “No.”

“Giulia’s got a second bedroom,” Hermione said. “Why don’t you stay over tonight? You can always get a hotel in the morning, if you want to.”

He cast an amused glance her way. “Are you propositioning me, Granger?”

“You wish.” She was careful not to look at him. “How much do you know about girls, anyway?”

“First a proposition, then an intensely personal question. Really, Miss Granger!”

“Shut up, Malfoy.” She’d turned pink. He laughed.

“I know enough about girls to know that Pansy Parkinson’s a slut.” He tickled her palm with his thumb, delighted when she colored and jerked her hand away. “Not so sure about you. Up until this afternoon, I’d have figured you for virgin-pure.”

“Oh, so the minute a girl puts on a short skirt she’s automatically a hooker? That is so shallow of you.”

“So you ARE a virgin,” he said, and grinned at the look of fury she threw at him. “Don’t look so offended, Granger. It’s not a crime, you know.”

“I know that!” She glared at him. “And why are we talking about this, anyway? I offered you my second bedroom, not my maidenhead, for God’s sake.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I’d be delighted.”

They were in front of her building. She pulled out her key and was about to open the security door when he put his hand on her arm.

“We get inside, you aren’t going to let me do this,” he said softly. “So let’s just get it out of the way out here.”

She saw it coming, but didn’t try to move. He bent his head, scooped her closer with one arm at the small of her back. His mouth was cool and firm against hers. She didn’t struggle.

He stepped back and smiled at her. Dangerous, Hermione thought, and pushed past him.

She didn’t sleep well.

**

TBC