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Unstoppable	By : Thunderbird Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 14474 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any affiliated characters. I make no profit from this story.

Chapter List
- 7
- 8
- 9
A/N: Thank you for the reviews, as always. You keep me motivated, my wonderful regulars. It's all for you, you know :)
Time to finally return to Vesper! She's been neglected. But I hope this makes up for it, because there's some juicy stuff in here. And of course I want to know what you think, so please keep reviewing!
Warnings: M/F lemons.
Chapter 8: Shadow
(Vesper)

“Is that going to bother you?”
Vesper turned to follow Declan’s pointed finger, which was indicating a group of their fellow Auror trainees gathered around a large table not far away. They were doing shots of firewhiskey, from the looks of it, Chadwick Dempsey egging the others on, the loudest of them all.
“It’s fine,” she said.
“I only intended to invite Green and Fischer, since they’re of the decent sort.” Vesper nodded. She liked them too. “But apparently when you invite one, you invite them all.”
She laughed at that, taking a sip of her own whiskey. Yes, the younger ones did seem to roll in a large gang, which was unfortunate. She was discovering that while some of them, like Dempsey, remained obnoxious no matter what, there were others that were actually pretty cool once you got them alone. She’d had pleasant interaction with Archie Green and Kenneth Fischer both over the past week and a half. Still, Dempsey’s presence was almost enough to ruin it.
She had thought, actually, that it was going to be just her and Declan that night, grabbing drinks at a nearby bar. She’d gotten it into her head that he was attracted to her, and was sure that he would want to keep it just the two of them. When he mentioned inviting others she had been surprised, but not necessarily disappointed. She liked Declan. She liked him a lot. But she was way too mixed up to date at the moment and the fact that he seemed to be respecting that came as a relief.
Even so, they’d found themselves their own little table, just separate enough from the rest to have their own conversation, and that suited her just fine.
“How’s the whiskey treating you?” Declan asked with a smile before taking a sip of his beer.
“Great, as usual,” she said. He’d been so impressed that she’d ordered it neat: no ice, no mixers.
“Got to keep up with the boys, I guess,” he said.
She rolled her eyes. “I’ll have you know I’ve been drinking bourbon and moonshine with my Grandpa since before I graduated from Ilvermorny. I know how to drink. Better than you, probably.”
He laughed. “It just surprised me, is all.”
“Men are always surprised when women enjoy unadulterated liquor, which I’ve never understood. It’s like they think drinking it straight is somehow ‘manly’ or something.”
“It is,” Declan insisted.
“Then I must be the manliest of them all,” she declared before downing the rest of hers. She clacked her glass on the table and gave him a grin.
Declan grinned back and leaned in closer. “You’ve got bigger bollocks than most of the men in here, no question,” he said, making her laugh. “An admirable thing, to be sure. You want another?”
“Sure, thanks.”
Declan left her for a moment, and she looked around the bar, taking in the other patrons and what they were up to. The group they’d come in with was rowdy and already a little red-faced, currently having a laugh at someone’s expense, although Vesper couldn’t exactly see who. There were a couple of older gentlemen as well, seated at the bar and ignoring the noise, focused on their drinks, and a small group of men in business attire on the other side of the room. Vesper realized, as she looked at them, that she recognized a few of them. She knew them tangentially through Blaise, but not well enough to get up and say hello. One of them, though, Alan Picard, met her eye and gave her a nod in greeting, which she returned with a polite smile and a raise of her empty whiskey glass.
Declan returned then, two whiskeys in hand. He put one in front of her and kept one for himself, though his beer was only halfway finished.
“Double-fisting it, I see,” she said.
“What?”
“Sorry, Muggle phrase. It means you’re having two drinks at once.”
Ah.” He smiled in understanding. “Well, I have to keep up with you, don’t I?”
“That will be challenging,” she riposted. “I have a liver of steel. It’s goblin-made, in fact. It only takes in that which makes it stronger.”
He laughed and took a sip of his drink. “So,” he said, “what did you think of the rundown they gave us on the departments today? Anything strike your fancy?”
She thought about that. “Not sure. I like the idea of something with a lot of field work. I don’t want to be cooped up in the office all the time.”
“Sure,” Declan agreed.
“Plus I would say I’m much better in action than I am sitting still. I feel like I’d serve them better with my dueling skills than my investigative skills, or lack thereof, as the case may be.”
“Oi, don’t sell yourself short,” he said. “You’re smarter than you look.”
She flipped him the finger and he laughed heartily.
“I know what you mean, though,” he said, after a minute. “It’s a lot more office time for most departments than I was expecting. I somehow thought we’d be out catching dark wizards all the time, bringing them in by the dozens.”
Vesper nodded. She had thought much the same. But, it turned out, there weren’t all that many dark wizards anymore, at least not ones who were committing illegal acts on the level of heinous like the Death Eaters had. Plus, to catch the ones that were, you had to spend a lot of time interviewing and investigating and figuring out where the criminals were exactly, before you could even begin to try and bring them in.
For the most part, Aurors dealt with much smaller offenses: illegal tampering with magical goods, the smuggling of dark artifacts or other contraband, and performance of experimental magic without a license. Aurors still got into scuffles and duels with these criminals on occasion, but it appeared as though Vesper’s dueling skills weren’t going to be put to use as often as she expected. The job was going to be as mental as it was physical.
“It honestly makes me kind of nervous,” she confessed. “I thought I’d be coming in with an advantage, with my dueling background and all, but that doesn’t seem to really be the case.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” replied Declan. “You’re a bloody world champion, for Merlin’s sake. You wipe the floor with the rest of us; I feel bad for any wizard that got in your way. Not to mention, all joking aside, you’re ace in the classroom as well. You’ll be fine.” He was looking at her warmly, and Vesper got that feeling again, like he wanted something more from her than just friendship. It made her stomach flutter a little, and she couldn’t decide if she liked the feeling or not.
“Well, you’ll be fine, too,” she said. “With all that investigation and curse-breaker experience.” Before joining the Academy Declan had worked for the Ministry in a different capacity, as a curse-breaker. The way he described it seemed very much in line with Auror work, and she wasn’t surprised that he’d made the jump.
“Yeah, I’ll be decent, I suppose,” he said.
“Better than decent.”
He shrugged. “I’ve always been very… competent at things, I would say. But never truly exceptional at any one thing. Not like you.”
She blushed and took a sip of whiskey.
“How did you get into it, anyway? Dueling, I mean?”
Vesper bit her lip and repressed a sigh. This was not her favorite story to tell. “Well, I used to be a dancer. When I was a kid and into my teenage years. I preferred it to school, for the most part. I just liked to move around a lot, I guess. Be active, you know?”
“What kind of dance?”
“Ballet at first, jazz and modern after that… and, when I got older, ballroom, swing, hip-hop, you name it.”
“I don’t know what half of those things are that you just named,” he admitted.
She smiled. “Don’t worry about it. Suffice it to say that if it involved moving to music, I was interested.”
“I see. So what changed?”
She swallowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, what made you move away from dance and into dueling?”
Her grip on her glass tightened, and for a moment she considered making something up rather than telling the truth. She wasn’t ashamed of this part of her personal history, not by any stretch, but it wasn’t exactly fitting for casual conversation. There were some people, Harry Potter being a prime example, who she felt she could tell without hesitation, because they had been through enough trauma themselves that they would know better than to look at her or treat her differently. But most people, well… learning the truth always seemed to change things between them, even just a little. She wasn’t looking forward to the pitying look that Declan would undoubtedly give her.
“I was… when I was fifteen I was assaulted.” She cleared her throat. “Sexually. And um… well what is there to say besides that it kind of messed me up for a while? I was in a pretty dark place for a few months and then… I don’t know. I got a Mind Healer, obviously. My parents made sure of that. And I figured out that what I really needed was to feel safe, feel like I could take care of myself and like if something like that were to happen again I could…” She swallowed, her own words unnerving her. “Protect myself.” She risked a glance at Declan to find that he was looking at her, not with pity necessarily, but with compassion. It spurred her on. “My uncle is a world class dueling instructor and I asked him for lessons, just self-defense kind of stuff and one thing led to another and I found I really liked it. So I decided to start competing and…” She shrugged. “The rest is history.”
Declan was watching her intently, and she realized she was barely breathing, waiting for his response.
“Wow. Talk about turning something horrible into something extraordinary,” he said finally.
She looked at him, surprised. “I’ve never thought about it like that before.”
Declan smiled. “You remind me of my sister, Bridget, a little. She was in a really bad marriage. Abusive. It took her a couple of years to figure it out, that she deserved better, but once she did… once she took charge of her own life, it was like she was a whole new person. She’s devoted her life to helping other women get out of bad situations. She turned her pain into something good, into something that helped people. I think that’s really admirable. Because… I mean, bad things happen, you know? We can’t avoid it.”
“Try as we might,” Vesper said, staring into her whiskey glass.
“Indeed. But there’s nothing we can do, a lot of the time, to stop bad things from happening. But it’s what we do afterward that matters. That’s when we know who we really are.”
Vesper had to admit that Declan was far exceeding her expectations at every turn. She couldn’t help but smile at him, feeling more warmly towards him than ever.
“Another round?” she asked, seeing that his beer glass was empty and his whiskey glass nearly so.
“Sure, I’ll get them.”
“No, no,” she said, placing a hand on his arm to stop him from getting up. “It’s my turn. What’ll you have?”
He glanced down at her hand for a moment, then back up at her face, his eyes glinting a little in a way that made her stomach somersault. “I’ll have another summer ale. Thanks.”
She left the table and made her way to the bar, a little flustered. Did she like Declan like… like that? She wasn’t entirely sure what she was feeling. He was so easy to talk to, and had surprising depth as well. He was just the type of guy, in her pre-Blaise days, that she would have gone for. But then again, none of her relationships before Blaise really lasted.
Not that the one with Blaise had lasted either.
“Two summer ales, please,” she told the bartender once she had his attention.
“Those both for you, love?” said an amused voice to her right. She turned to see a blond wizard who was probably in his early thirties looking at her with an interested twinkle in his eye.
“No, they’re not,” she said, giving him what she hoped was a friendly but not flirty smile. “They’re for me and my friend.” She indicated the table where Declan sat, waiting for her.
“Ah, I see. Too bad. I was going to offer to buy you a drink myself.”
“That’s sweet, but I’m all set, thanks.”
“Anytime, love,” he replied, as the bartender put the two pints of ale in front of her. “You ever get tired of him, you just come back here, then.”
“I don’t see that happening,” she said brightly as she paid for the drinks. “But I’ll keep it in mind.”
Secretly relieved to be going, she grabbed the drinks and headed back to the table, handing Declan his.
“Thanks,” he said. He glanced over at the bar. “Getting chatted up, I see.”
She rolled her eyes. “Just the usual conversational do-si-do. Nothing all that interesting to report.”
“You get hit on a lot, don’t you?”
Vesper was about to protest, but then she really thought about it. In actuality, she did get hit on a lot. She didn’t really understand why exactly. She’d never been what one would consider conventionally pretty. Her features were a bit too sharp to be truly feminine. Her brow was defined, her jaw square, her nose angular and prominent. She hardly had the soft, delicate features of a beauty like, say, Daphne Greengrass.
Just as an example.
Her body, too, was not what men usually seemed to be looking for. She’d spent most of her life choosing function over form, and as a result athleticism had stolen most of her curves. There was little softness to be found anywhere. Her arms were toned, her abs defined, and her legs muscular, things she knew men didn’t always find attractive. Her boyfriend at Ilvermorny once commented offhand that it was too bad she had no breasts to speak of. She had laughed that off at the time, to save face, but it had stung.
On top of that, her hair was stringy, limp, and nondescript in color. Maybe if it had the intriguing texture of Hermione’s or the eye-catching color of Ginny Weasley’s she could do something with it. But as it was it was just sort of there, just another thing that made her average in the looks department.
And yet men were drawn to her. They had been since she was a teenager. And she had no idea why.
“I guess I’m just nice and approachable,” she said with a shrug. Declan narrowed his eyes thoughtfully but said nothing. “So, do you have any other siblings besides that sister you mentioned?” she asked, looking to change the subject.
He nodded. “I have a younger brother as well. My sister is older than me, so that puts me in the middle.”
“Same here! I’m a middle child too. I have an older brother and a younger one.”
“Do you like it, being in the middle?”
Vesper shrugged. “It’s ok, I guess. It’s hard to know where I fit in, sometimes.”
“For me as well. Actually, my case is a bit extreme, since my parents are Muggles, and I’m the only magical child they had.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. It was especially tough when I was a kid. Weird stuff was always happening to me, you know how it goes. And my parents were working class folks, not a lot of money, not the most open-minded people. It was rough going at first. I felt very alienated.”
Vesper nodded. “That sounds rough.”
“It got better once I got my Hogwarts letter and Albus Dumbledore came to explain to me and my parents that I was a wizard. It was like a revelation. Suddenly everything made sense.”
“How did your parents react?”
“Shocked, mostly, they were. But they got accustomed to the idea after a while. And my siblings thought it was ace. They weren’t jealous at all, which was surprising.”
She smiled. “That’s great. So you stay in touch with them?”
“With my siblings more than my parents, honestly, but yeah, sure. I go home for Christmas and the like. What about you? You close with your brothers?”
“Sort of. I used to be, at least. I don’t go home all that much, so communication is tough. And we’re all really different. I get along with my younger brother more than my older one. He just…” She trailed off. “Ok, this is going to sound bad, but it’s just that he doesn’t judge me as much, you know, for my choices. He’s a laid back guy, has a ‘live and let live’ kind of attitude that I really like.”
“Your other brother judges you?”
Vesper shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. Archer, that’s the older one, he’s like a perfect blend of my parents. He’s intellectual, and thoughtful, and hardworking, and he followed this very set path that they wanted for him. He went into academics, just like they did, he was in Horned Serpent, which was my mom’s house at Ilvermorny. My dad’s from the UK actually, and he was in Ravenclaw, which is very similar. They’re just like three peas in a pod, and then I came along and I… I didn’t really fit in. My mom says it’s because I have ‘an independent spirit.’”
He smiled. “Yeah, I can see that.”
“They weren’t surprised when I was immediately sorted into Thunderbird, but I could tell they were disappointed.”
“And your younger brother, where does he fit in?”
“He doesn’t really. We’re similar in that way. In some ways he’s actually been more of a disappointment to our parents than I have. They couldn’t relate to the fact that I liked dance and dueling more than schoolwork, but they understood that it was just a part of my nature. For Silas… well, he was one of those rarities that got selected for two houses when he was sorted.”
“Two houses?” Declan asked, his tone incredulous.
“Sometimes, very rarely, more than one house will try to vie for a student during the sorting. When that happens the student gets to choose which house they’d prefer. Silas had a choice between Horned Serpent and Pukwudgie, and he chose Pukwudgie. My parents, my mom especially, had a field day over that. She didn’t understand at all.”
“So he has an independent spirit too.”
“Oh yeah,” Vesper agreed. “He marches to the beat of his own drum for sure. He never really does anything our parents expect of him. It sort of inches me out of my spot as black sheep of the family, but I’m fine with that.”
Declan laughed. “Understandably. I doubt anyone really wants that position.”
“I don’t know. Honestly it seems like Silas has kind of embraced it by this point. He doesn’t really care what other people think. I envy him that.”
Declan considered that. “That would be nice, but I always wonder… people who seem to not care… I always wonder if maybe they secretly do anyway, and they’re just good at hiding it. I mean honestly, I would say the same about you. You seem very comfortable in your own skin, content to do what you want. I’d never guess you had any self-consciousness at all.”
“Really?” she asked, tilting her head.
“Really. But obviously you do. Everybody does. That’s like… just being human, right?”
She thought about that. “I guess you’re right.” She gave him a smile that he returned readily. She really liked him. She liked him more and more as time went on.
“Oi, you two!” called Fischer, getting their attention. “You going to ignore us all night or what?”
“Yeah, come over here,” Green chimed in. “We’re having a debate and we need your input.”
Declan looked at Vesper, raising his eyebrows in a silent question.
She shrugged. “May as well. Ron did tell me to make more of an effort to get to know them.”
They picked up their pints and went over to join their fellow trainees, where they were met with enthusiasm.
“All right, what’s the debate, then?” Declan asked.
“Whether Kemp can beat any of us at arm wrestling,” said Fischer with a grin. “Me, I’m out of shape, and she’s got the muscle, so I bet she can beat me no problem. Dempsey disagrees.”
Vesper glanced at Dempsey, who was looking at her with a dangerous glint in his eyes. Of course he did. He’d had it out for her since day one. She turned back to Fischer. “I honestly have no idea if I could beat you. I can beat both my brothers, I’ll tell you that.”
“Good enough for me,” said Fischer.
“No, she’s got to prove it,” said Dempsey. “I’ll wager five galleons you could beat her.”
“I’ll take that bet,” said Declan, giving Vesper a wink.
“Me too,” said Green.
“My money’s on Fischer,” said Abernathy.
One by one, they all anted up, about half going for Vesper and the other half for Fischer.
“I’d bet on you, but then you’d suspect me of throwing the contest,” Fischer said to her with a smile as they cleared enough space on the table for them to place their elbows down.
“You’d better not throw it,” she warned him. “If I win this thing, I win it fair and square.”
“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” he replied with a grin, getting into position. He looked around the room. “Wands away, lads. No magical interference here.”
Vesper clasped his hand, grounding herself in her chair. She really had no idea what would happen. Fischer may have even been hustling her. It did take a lot for a woman to have upper body strength comparable to a man’s. But she didn’t much care. If this was how she got in with the boys, then so be it, even if she lost.
“Ready…” said Declan, who was apparently acting as referee. Fischer’s hand tightened in hers. “Go!”
She pushed as hard as she could, drawing strength from her core, but Fischer was strong too, and he put up one hell of a fight. She wasn’t sure this was going to end well, but she kept pushing, aware that her face was screwed up with the effort. But then again, so was Fischer’s, and he hadn’t gotten her to give an inch.
Suddenly, amazingly, his strength started to wane, and she was edging him downwards.
“Shit, shit, shit!” he yelled, half laughing, half growling as his hand fell before hitting the table with a thunk.
Vesper threw up her arms in victory, and everyone at the table cheered, except Dempsey, of course.
“Damn woman, you’re strong,” said Fischer, shaking out his hand.
“So are you,” she said with a grin. “I thought you had me for a minute there.”
“I want a go,” said Abernathy, standing up to try and take Fischer’s place.
“Me too,” said O’Rourke. “I want next.”
“Y’all are gonna wear me out,” Vesper said, rolling her shoulder. “But fine. Let’s see how this goes.”
She was able to beat Abernathy, but not O’Rourke, and by the time Green stepped up to take his turn, she was already feeling the strain.
“This and then I’m done,” she told them, and they all groaned. “Why don’t you all arm wrestle each other if you want to so badly?” she said.
“Because it’s a lot more fun to watch you,” said Fischer.
Vesper sighed. This was the downside, sometimes, of being the only woman among a group of men. You were either ignored outright or the constant center of attention. And she got the latter, more often than not.
Thankfully they did grow bored of the game after a little while, and focus turned back to drinking and loud conversation. Vesper let herself relax, joining in only when she felt like it, but otherwise just listening. Most of the trainees had known each other for years, of course, having all been together at Hogwarts around the same time, and they had all sorts of inside jokes funny anecdotes about each other.
In the end Vesper was glad she and Declan had joined them. It was clear she and Dempsey were never going to be friendly, the way he kept sneering at her all night, but she didn’t care. She’d connected with most of the others, and they were treating her more like a colleague than they had that first week. All in all, it was progress.
But eventually she was ready to call it a night, especially since they had training first thing the next morning, and she bid them all goodbye.
“I’ll walk you,” Declan said, standing up abruptly. Vesper saw some of the others exchange knowing looks, and gathered that they suspected the same thing she did. No doubt they would be gossiping about it after she and Declan were gone.
They left the bar, heading down the block towards the closest Apparition point.
“Would you like me to Apparate with you?” he asked her. “Make sure you get home safe?”
She smiled but shook her head. “Thanks, but I’m good.”
“You sure? It’s not always safe out here, even for a badarse girl like you. I really don’t mind.”
“I know, but I’ll be fine. I live in a warded neighborhood, actually. I can just Apparate right to my front gate.” A few years ago the Ministry had started finding pockets in residential areas of London that were entirely magical and warding them so that Muggles would avoid them. It was convenient, because it allowed witches and wizards to do magic outdoors, so long as they were within the wards, without violating the Statute of Secrecy. Vesper was lucky enough to live in such a neighborhood, though they were becoming more and more common.
“Lucky you,” said Declan. “How did you swing that?”
“My uncle, actually,” she said. “He bought me a house as a thank you gift when I finished my apprenticeship with him.”
“He bought you a house?”
“Yeah, it’s a little excessive, I know,” she said with a laugh. “But he and I are really close and he doesn’t have any kids of his own, so he basically sees me as his daughter.”
“Still, it’s quite generous,” said Declan.
“Yeah, it is.” It had been a real surprise, too. She’d been saving up methodically and carefully during her time as Aurelian’s apprentice, hoping to have enough for a down payment on something small but livable. And then her uncle went and purchased her a beautiful three-bedroom home all for her (though Blaise had certainly spent a lot of time there, too, of course). She’d been so shocked when she saw it that she’d burst into tears, which hardly ever happened.
They arrived at the Apparition point, and Declan turned to her, giving her a soft smile. “I had fun tonight,” he said.
“Me too,” she replied, getting a definite “end-of-a-date” vibe from him suddenly, even though it had been a group outing. Was he going to kiss her?
“We should do it again sometime,” he said.
“Yeah, definitely.”
He leaned down, but only to give her a peck on the cheek. She couldn’t help but note the relief she felt at that, despite the fact that she knew she liked him. She just wasn’t ready for more, it seemed.
She took out her wand. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said.
“Bright and early,” he replied.
She turned on the spot, enduring that compressed, sucked-through-a-tube feeling for a moment before landing on familiar ground right at her front gate, just as she’d told Declan she would. She stuck her wand in her back pocket and opened the gate.
It wasn’t until she’d closed it behind her and turned that she realized she wasn’t alone. There was someone sitting on her front stoop, and her stomach lurched out of surprise. Then her heart rate spiked as she took in who it was.
Blaise sat there, looking at her. His elbows were resting on his knees, his hands clasped in front of him. The sleeves of his crisp white shirt were rolled up, revealing dark, wiry forearms that were flexing with tension. He seemed taut, almost springloaded, not a usual attitude for him.
She stepped closer to him, just so she could make him out better in the dim light at her front door. All thoughts of Declan and her confused feelings for him were swept from her mind as she looked at her ex, wondering what he was doing there, waiting for him to speak.
“Hey,” she said finally, when it became obvious that he wasn’t going to talk first.
“Good evening.” He stared at her for a moment, his gaze unwavering. “You’re alone.”
She stared back, confused. “Yes…”
“I heard…” He cleared his throat. “I heard you were out with someone.”
Really? She crossed her arms over her chest. “From who?”
“Picard.”
She let out the smallest of scoffs. “Of course.” She shook her head. “What did he do? Send you a Patronus or something after he left the bar?”
“He floo called me when he got home.”
“Gotcha.” She stared down at her shoes.
“You’re irritated with me.”
“I don’t like feeling like I’m being spied on.”
“No one is spying on you.”
“Really? Because it sounds like that is exactly what Picard was doing.” This was escalating fast, adrenaline coursing through her, but this unexpected visit was unnerving, after an otherwise relaxed night.
“I didn’t ask him to, if that’s what you’re implying. He simply… we do business together, and he saw you out with a man and thought I might be interested to know that.”
“Why? Why would he think you’d be interested?”
“Because I am.”
Dammit, Blaise. This was, possibly, the most maddening thing about him. As long as he kept silent he was almost impossible to read, unless you knew him very well and were watching very closely. But when he opened his mouth he had a tendency to be starkly, heartbreakingly honest. It brought Vesper to her knees, sometimes. That used to be a good thing, but it wasn’t so much anymore.
Why? Why are you interested?
She almost asked it. The problem was, he might answer that one honestly too.
“Picard wasted a call,” she said instead. “It was nothing. Just drinks with a friend.”
“Who?”
Vesper rolled her eyes. “Declan Ross.”
He considered that a moment. “I don’t know who that is.”
“He was a Gryffindor a few years above you at Hogwarts. He’s in my training class.”
He blinked at her slowly, his usual impassive expression in place. “I see.”
“Yeah.”
“Picard thought you looked quite cozy.”
His voice was neutral, free of pain, so how was it that he could still make her feel guilty, just by looking at her like that?
“Well, Picard’s a shameless gossip,” she said, a little sharply. Blaise merely raised an eyebrow. “It wasn’t even just me and Declan anyway. There were others from our class there too. I mean, it was originally just going to be us and the others tagged along… not that it matters.” She was babbling now, because she was uncomfortable, and he was still watching her with that blank stare she wished she could smack right off him. Why does he make me feel like this? The whole situation pissed her off. “Not that it matters,” she repeated, more forcefully now, “because it’s none of your goddamn business who I’m out with. And it would be hypocritical for you to think it is, considering you literally just took Daphne Greengrass to the DTF gala on Saturday.”
He sighed. “She’s a friend, Vesper,” he said. “We’ve known each other since we were children. Her father mentioned to me offhand that she’d always wanted to go and since… since we’re not… since I didn’t have a date I asked her. It was just to be friendly.”
“Yeah, well, the Daily Prophet is under the impression that you two are an item,” she said, before immediately biting her tongue. She had not meant to admit that she had been reading up on him. In fact, she hadn’t meant to even look at the society pages at all, but she knew… she knew there would most likely be photos and…
What could she say? She was weak. She had looked.
And she knew how the pureblood world worked. She had lived in this country long enough to figure it out by now. If Daphne’s father had urged Blaise to take Daphne to the gala, it wasn’t out of some innocent desire for her to have frivolous fun. It was a calculated move to bring them closer together, in the hopes that something more would unfold between them. Daphne was an unmarried pureblood in her mid-twenties and Blaise a highly eligible prospect by any pureblood’s standards. It was just simple arithmetic, really.
“Yes, well, the Daily Prophet’s always right, isn’t it?” Blaise said drily.
She stared at him. He wasn’t stupid; he must know that Mr. Greengrass had designs for him to end up with Daphne, and that such a scheme would most likely include the public’s awareness of a burgeoning courtship. The Prophet’s coverage had been anticipated, encouraged, by the Greengrass patriarch, and Blaise had to know that. He was never one to be so naïve as to believe otherwise. But, in this moment, he was treating Vesper like she was, hoping she would simply take his word for it.
The problem was, part of her (all right, most of her, really) wanted to take him at his word, despite everything.
“Me believing what I read in the Prophet is no worse than you believing Picard,” she said finally.
“So we’re both guilty of the same crime. We’re just one in the same, in the end, aren’t we?”
“Except that when you go out on a date, I don’t show up at your house in the middle of the night to make sure you haven’t taken them home with you.”
That brought him up short; she could tell by the subtle lurch of his shoulders. “No,” he said finally. “You don’t.” He almost sounded angry about it.
“You know why?”
His eyes narrowed. “Because it’s none of your goddamn business whom I go home with?” he ventured in a dry drawl.
“Precisely,” she said, giving him a brittle smile.
He absorbed that for a minute. “So it was a date, then. You are involved with that Gryffindor, after all.”
“No,” Vesper said in a tone of forced patience. “I already told you, he’s just a friend.”
“And I told you Daphne is just a friend.”
“Which is fine,” said Vesper. “But if she were more than a friend, that would be fine too, because we both have the right to see other people, like we agreed.”
He stared at her some more.
“Are you getting what I’m saying?”
His jaw clenched, just a little. “Yes.”
“So…” Vesper said, hoping he would take the hint.
“So.”
Vesper waited. “So…” she went on, frustrated. “What are you doing here, then?”
Of course, she already knew the answer. This was not the first time in the past four months that Blaise had shown up on her doorstep. Granted, it was the first time he had shown up this late at night, and the first time he had ever waited on her front stoop for her to come home. But still, they had been here before. She knew what came next.
“I’ve been… thinking about you.”
Vesper swallowed. “Is that right?”
“Yes, it is.”
She closed her eyes. She had been trying so hard. She had been trying to let this be ok, to let it be clean, and simple, and done.
But he just kept coming back around, like she was a planet and he a satellite unable to break out of her orbit, try as he might. She didn’t ask this of him, of course. She didn’t do anything but just stand there. But even so he circled and circled, passing out of sight for a time and then coming back into view.
Did this make him happy or did it make him miserable? She had no idea. But she knew how she felt about it.
Confused. She was damn confused. Declan doesn't make me confused like this, she couldn't help but think.
She took a few steps closer, hoping he would let her pass him and reach her front door. He stood, then, and her stomach dropped. “I’m really tired, Blaise,” she said. “I just want to go to bed.”
They were only inches from each other now, right in front of the stoop, and she found it hard to breathe.
Then again, Declan doesn't make me feel this alive, either.
She felt it, that familiar humming energy, that gravitational pull. He did too, she knew, because a hand lifted, very slowly, and touched her, lightly, almost imperceptibly, on the sensitive skin of her inner forearm.
She closed her eyes again. This was his power. This was the thing that got her every time. There were countless things about him that made him wonderful, of course, but this, this passion, this ardor, at once intense and yet restrained, as if containing it was the only thing keeping it from shattering the world, this was her downfall.
She could sense, in the light brush of his fingers, in the controlled rhythm of his breath, just how much he wanted her, and it made her feel torn open, like a wound. It made waves of heat waft over her neck and little lights dance in front of her eyes and, inexplicably, the Fugees’ version of “Killing Me Softly” play in her head.
Every damn time. Just from one touch.
How she had survived him up to this point, she had no idea.
“Blaise…” she began, her voice meek in her own ears.
“I’ve been thinking about you,” he said again, soft and earnest. “I think about you all the time.”
It was impossible, futile, to explain to him that that was just the way it goes. That was what happened when you ended things after three years, three amazing years, with someone you loved. It was painful. It was supposed to be painful. It was a process that would resolve itself over time. But it did require time.
Blaise didn’t really think like that. Somehow, in his mind, the fact that he continued to think about her after he had left her meant not simply that he had loved her, but that he must still love her. She didn’t know how to explain to him that it wasn’t necessarily the case.
And he wouldn’t have listened anyway, stubborn bastard that he was.
“Well,” she said, because she had to say something, or else she would simply close the tiny distance and kiss him. “Stop thinking.”
She stepped passed him, towards her front door, glad her key was right there in her pocket and she could unlock and open the door quickly. She spared him one more glance. “Go home.” She meant the words to sound firm, but they only came out resigned.
Once inside she took a deep breath, then set her keys in the little bowl on her foyer table where they belonged. She stood stark still, staring at them without really seeing them, and then started counting backwards in her head.
10…
She always started with 10. 10 seconds was just the right amount of time.
9… 8…
Too little time, and she wasn’t even really giving him the chance to walk away.
7… 6…
Too much, and she would almost guarantee that he would leave.
5… 4…
Still, she made the counts long, more than a second each, in actuality.
3…
A long count of 10. It gave him time to deliberate, to decide, to act.
Or not act.
2…
If he had already walked away by now, if she opened the door and he was already gone, then it was for the best, really.
1…
But if he was still there when she turned back, well… what could she say?
She was weak.
0.
She turned, walked to the door with purpose, and opened it.
He stood there, one hand resting on the frame of the door, leaning into it like he had been waiting for her all along. Still, his expression was neither knowing nor smug. If it had been, she would have slammed the door in his face.
But, as it was, he just looked hungry. It made her blood sizzle.
So she stepped away, leaving the door open, and turned, making for the stairs.
He would come in, close and lock the door behind him, get the foyer lights with a wave of his wand, and follow her to her room. He didn’t need verbal instructions. He would just know.
Once she was in her bedroom she took her time undressing in solemn silence, not dissimilar to how she prepared herself before a duel. She unclasped her watch and set it on the dresser, removed her earrings one at a time, and took off the ring on her right hand. Then she pulled her shirt over her head, turning it right side out again and tossing it in her laundry basket.
He had arrived by now. She could hear the quiet shuffling of his feet on the carpet. But he was lingering just outside, hesitant, maybe, or something else. Maybe just watching.
So she reached down to the button of her jeans and popped it undone, then slid down the zipper of her fly deliberately, but not too quickly. She gripped the sides of the jeans and swayed her hips, shuffling herself out of their tight confines, bending to pull them down her legs, and stepping out of them one foot at a time.
Her bra would be next, but she paused. He was coming closer, she could sense it. He was maybe only a couple of feet away.
She turned and he was there, even closer than she realized, looking down at her with a softness that was liquefying and unnerving all at once. He had removed his shoes, she could see as she glanced down, and had even undone a couple of the buttons of his shirt. It left a delicious triangular wedge of milk chocolate skin exposed to the air, and she bent her head to place her lips on it.
He released a shaky breath, and it encouraged her to continue. She ran soft kisses along his skin, tasting him, while her fingers reached up and continued his previous work, exposing more and more of him with each undoing of a button until his shirt fell open completely.
He had always tasted a bit like chocolate himself, she thought as her lips grazed his collarbone. Rich and earthy, a perfect combination of bitter and sweet, with just a hint of salt. Wonderful, indulgent, and painfully familiar.
One of his hands came to rest on her waist as she tilted upwards, nuzzling into his neck, up under his jaw. The other had wound its way into her hair, pulling a little in a silent plea for more.
She reached his chin and paused there, waiting for him to come to her.
And come to her he did. It took only a second, and then his mouth was on hers, all his restraint gone. His grip tightened in her hair as their lips and tongues moved together ravenously, and she couldn’t help a small, breathy moan. Her hands were all over his torso, feeling that smooth, dark skin, and it made his breath ragged in her mouth. He was already hard, she could freely feel as she pressed against him, and it made her lose all sense. She had forgotten, somehow, how easy it was for her to turn him on, just with her touch, that she had the same effect on him that he had on her. It was a heady, intoxicating thing to remember and it drowned out all of her doubts and insecurities in an instant.
Never breaking the kiss, she maneuvered them towards the bed, all the while pulling at his shirt to let it slide down his arms and onto the floor. He made for the clasp of her bra as she worked on his belt, and soon her bra was dispensed with altogether and his pants were on the floor. Vesper remained kneeling at his feet so she could get a good look at him once she’d freed him from the confines of his black boxer briefs.
She grabbed, pulled downwards, and found her mouth watering at the sight of him, his magnificent, dark cock hailing proudly at her, begging to be taken. She leaned forward, her tongue coming out just a little to lick the tip, but a hand was suddenly in her hair, cupping the back of her head and pulling upwards gently.
She stood willingly. She had forgotten that he didn’t seem to want that anymore, not since their relationship had become little more than the occasional sexual encounter. Perhaps it was too intimate for him. Or he was worried he would come too soon, and he wanted to make it last, since he didn’t know when he would get it again. Vesper didn’t know the reason, and she wasn’t about to ask.
It used to be that they had sex all kinds of ways: playful morning romps after they’d just woken up, frenzied, half-clothed fucks in his office when he was supposed to be working, slow, languid explorations of each other’s bodies in the shroud of night that seemed to go on and on. They’d never had a routine before. They did it however they felt like in the moment.
But now it was always the same: tender, sensual, and a little desperate. And silent. They would barely speak at all, only cue each other with their bodies and their breath. Vesper didn’t know why this was. It just was.
He kissed her sweetly, like an apology, and began negotiating her onto the bed. She lay back and immediately arched up to help with the removal of her panties as he made to slide them down her legs. Then his hands returned, trailing a finger up her left leg, lightly, teasingly, making her shudder.
He loomed over her, simply looking at her for a moment. His usual impassive mask was crumbling already, as it usually did by this point, revealing the truth that always lay hidden underneath: that he cared. He cared a hell of a lot. He was good at covering it up in most circumstances, but she had learned early on that there was something about physical intimacy that peeled that outer layer away, piece by piece.
He lowered himself onto her until they were pressed body to body, and without any cloth between them the feeling was incredible. She had missed this so much, this kind of closeness, and she let herself really savor it as she kissed him. His erection lingering at her entrance already had her arching against him with wanton need, and he responded by rubbing against her, stimulating them both as their moans intermingled in their mouths.
She broke the kiss. “The charm,” she reminded him softly. They had always relied on contraceptive charms to prevent pregnancy, since Vesper hated the way the potion made her feel and hadn’t been on it in years.
He nodded, peeling himself off her and finding the wand that was still in his pants pocket on the floor. When he’d waved it over her navel, muttering, and she felt the tingle inside her that indicated the charm had worked, she grabbed him, tossing him down so that she could straddle him. She actually heard him chuckle at that, low in his throat, and it made her smile, almost forgetting their situation, forgetting that he wasn’t really hers anymore. She was always one of the few people who could make him laugh. Each time was like a prize, hard-won, and all the sweeter for it.
Situated on top of him she started rubbing against him again, readying herself, coating him all over with the slickness of her arousal. Her hands were all over him too, running along his chest and stomach, tweaking his nipples, making the last vestiges of his mask fall away. He was staring at her now with so much hunger that it was almost predatory, but it didn’t scare her. It only spurred her on.
When she couldn’t take it anymore, when she couldn’t bear going another minute without him inside her, she lifted, positioning them both, and slowly impaled herself on him, savoring every inch.
Blaise let out a low groan as she engulfed him, his neck arching back, his hips rising to meet her. She began to move, slowly at first, steadying herself with the hands still on his chest, letting her internal muscles do most of the work. This was one of the advantages of being strong: the pleasure she could bring him, not to mention the pleasure she could bring herself as well. Each time she pulled him inside it hit at a sweet spot, a place where she was aching for him to be, and it built up her pleasure with every clench.
She let out a needy sigh as she began to move faster. It had been a while, a few weeks, in fact, and this alone was already spurring her on to orgasm faster than she ever would have thought. A small internal voice told her she should slow down, savor it, make it last, but she wasn’t sure her body was capable at the moment. Her Id was in control, and it wanted, needed, satisfaction.
“Ves-Vesper,” Blaise called out in a desperate, choked voice. His hands were clenched tightly on her hips, helping set the pace. “I… oh… I….” he babbled incoherently.
A scorching heat rolled through her at the sight of him slowly coming undone beneath her. Yes, he had power, he had passion, that could turn her into a puddle at his feet. But she had this. She had power too, and he was in her sway, no part of him untouched.
She was close, she realized, but needed more, needed a new angle. So she sat back a little, then tugged at his arms to get him to sit up. It took him a moment to realize what she wanted, but when he did he complied immediately, and suddenly they were chest to chest, her small breasts pressing into him. She looked into his eyes, which were so dark it was impossible to tell how wide his pupils had blown. But the adoration glistening in them told her enough.
She kissed him, delving her tongue into his mouth as she began moving again, more a rolling motion, this time, as though rubbing herself on him like a cat. He held onto her as he returned the kiss with fervor, then broke away from her mouth to tilt towards a hardened nipple, sucking on it and flicking it with his tongue.
Vesper gave him a breathy moan of approval as the sensation went straight to her core. She was even closer now, reaching the peak, the point of no return, the place from which the only way to go was to fall. Blaise still had his mouth on her breasts and his hands were helping too, brushing over the hotspots on her back and ribs, playing lightly in the crack of her ass, and stroking her perineum.
“Blaise,” she whispered. She had not intended to use his name. She tried not to, these days, if she could help it. But gods, he was driving her wild. She was going to come, and it was going to be amazing, because of him.
With a last desperate rolling of her hips and a well-timed pressing at her back entrance she was crying out, her orgasm overtaking her in a series of intense waves that seemed to go on and on. She knew she was clenching powerfully around Blaise’s cock, that he might come soon as well, and she also knew he was watching her explode, taking it all in. But she didn’t care much about that at the moment, as white spots flashed in front of her eyes and she rode it out, getting every last ounce of pleasure she could.
Finally her head collapsed onto his shoulder and she breathed heavily into his neck. His heart was pounding against hers, or, at least, that’s what it felt like. It could have been her heart alone, beating wildly; it was hard to tell.
Blaise gave her a moment to come down a little from her high, his hands running across her back in light strokes. But she could feel, now, that he was still hard inside her, and he would soon take his turn.
She lifted her head and placed her lips on his, the kiss sweeter and less desperate than before. But when he kissed her back it was filled with need, and she was hardly surprised when he rolled them over, his cock sinking deeper into her as he did so.
He lifted one of her thighs, adjusting his angle, and started moving, his thrusts going deeper and deeper, filling her. She arched, encouraging him, knowing he would like it, and he groaned.
He was kissing her at first, but as he started to move faster he couldn’t keep up with it. Soon his face was buried in her neck, his body shaking and frenzied, close to the brink.
“Vesper,” he said in her ear, his voice hoarse. “Vesper. I missed this so much. I missed you so much.”
Her stomach clenched in bittersweet pleasure as he came, clutching her tightly. She kissed his neck and his collarbone as he ground into her, wringing out all the pleasure just as she had done. He had filled her with cum, quite a lot of it, she could feel as he pulled out. So, perhaps he wasn’t really sleeping with Daphne Greengrass after all. Maybe he wasn’t sleeping with anyone, except her. The thought made her both deeply gratified and strangely depressed. What were they doing here?
His wand was still nearby and he waved it over them, cleaning them up. Then he turned off the lamp on the bedside table and settled himself next to her, pulling her close so her cheek rested against his heart, which was still pounding away in his chest.
I missed you so much. He hadn’t said anything like that before, not since the breakup anyway. What did it mean, if it meant anything at all? She could ask. She could press him on it. She could make him have a conversation about this, about what was happening, and what it meant.
But at the same time, she couldn’t. She just couldn’t.
So instead she closed her eyes, giving into the dark and everything that lived in it, and, eventually, drifted off.
Up Next: Teddy moves into Grimmauld with Harry and Draco.
Book_addict_89: Your wish is my command! Harry/Draco/Teddy time is next! And yes, Draco does still enjoy making Ron uncomfortable, although they get along much better than they used to, overall.
SickPuppy: Yeah, I couldn’t resist throwing in some Harry/Draco cuteness. I just love them so much :) And the plot just keeps on thickening with the Vesper/Blaise situation. I’ll be interested to hear what you thought of this one.
Dedicated_Reader: Thanks!! Yeah, Hermione/Ron really is an unpopular pairing in the fandom, and I kind of get why. They’re not the most obvious couple. But these two are really growing on me. I’m glad you’re enjoying it, too :)
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