Draco left the door open behind him, knowing Granger would follow without question. There really was no choice in the matter, unless she forfeited – which he was betting she absolutely wouldn't do in this game.
He was hoping she wouldn't either. He definitely wanted to get as much as he could out of this time together, knowing it would be the only chance he'd ever get the opportunity to touch, taste, or fuck Gryffindor's Princess. She definitely would never let him near her again after the game concluded, loathing him as she did.
Although, she'd actually blushed with undeniable arousal when he'd answered that he'd like to eat her pussy. He'd seen the glimmer of heat in her shocked gaze. And her answer when asked if she'd like to blow him had been negative only in so far as her fears of him using the incident against her later, not because she'd detest the idea of touching him. So, maybe she didn't hate him as much as either of them believed…
He caught a flash of brilliant colour from the corner of his eye as she entered and shut the door behind her. Circe's right tit, but that dress was fetching upon her! He'd love to take it off with his teeth…
She didn't move towards the bed in the centre of the room, where he was currently sprawled. Instead, she was staring up at the too-white ceiling, clearly uneasy with coming closer.
Well, if she wasn't going to take the initiative, he would.
"Since I drew my action card before you," he explained, "the rules say I go first."
"I assumed," she replied in a haughty, defensive tone and crossed her arms, already on guard. "Please don't treat me like I'm an imbecile, Malfoy."
"Have I ever stated, or implied that you were, Granger?" She glared at him, but it was clear she was mulling that fact over, recognizing its truth. He'd never once derided her for being intelligent, merely for how she'd liked to rub that fact into everyone else's face. "I'm merely reiterating the rules," he continued. "As Captain of a team, it's my duty."
She mumbled something under her breath he didn't catch, but by the vindictive gleam in her eye, he was betting it had something to do with gagging him and lighting his hair on fire. Before she actually decided that doing so would be a good idea, he held his Deeds card up and read it aloud:
DEED: You partner must list out loud at least 10 good things about you.
There was a moment of silence, and then a deeply expelled breath and a small laugh in relief. "That's it? That's- Oh, thank Merlin!"
Yes, well, Draco wasn't too pleased with his first draw. He'd really wanted something hot right out of the gate for her, but instead was stuck with a share-care card. Who the fuck wrote up such a wanky thing anyway? Obviously it wasn't a Slytherin.
"You can come into the room," he told her, disappointment spoiling his stomach. "I'm not going to touch you this round, it seems."
Taking a moment to gather her courage, Granger stepped forward and leaned against one of the four large wooden posts that made up the bed frame. Her back was still ramrod straight with engineered bravado, though, and she remained just out of reach. Draco sighed. He hadn't expected this to be an easy win, but really!
"All right, let's get started," he said, conceding to this round being a lame duck. "Tell me how fantastic I am, princess."
She rolled her eyes at the nickname. "Fantastic? Your list of drawbacks far outstrips your advantageous attributes, Malfoy. It would be far easier for me to list your negative personality quirks instead."
He gaped at her.
Gods, she could be such a bitch sometimes!
It was one of the reasons he wanted her so badly.
"You know, you've got one hell of a sexy, sassy mouth on you, Granger." He grinned, hoping to peck her off, turning the situation on its ear just to confuse her. "I can't wait to put it to better use later tonight."
Granger arched an eyebrow at him, not rising to the bait. "So, I'm just expected to stack your ridiculously overblown ego, then?" she asked, seeming exasperated by, but resigned to the task. "Fine, whatever. You're clever." Draco couldn't help the morphing of his grin into a full-blown, toothy smile. "Really? Do tell, pet. Just how sly and intelligent do you think I am?"
His partner gave him a flat stare. "Cunning enough to maneuver me into this game, hoping you'd be able to fix it so we could be together so you could attempt to humiliate me tonight, but not wise enough to research the cards you've been playing with enough to know the spell on them wouldn't allow such a thing. So, you're cagey and devious, Malfoy, but not what one might call ingenious."
Okay, that wasn't at all what he'd been expecting.
Clearly, she was going to insult him every time she had to praise him.
Fan-fucking-tastic. What a way to spend the next twenty-five minutes! "Moving on," he grumbled, feeling a bit deflated by the fact that he knew these were her totally honest feelings about him, as the cards wouldn't let her lie. It bit to think she was judging the entirety of his intellect solely upon this one minor, flawed expedition this weekend. Obviously, she was forgetting the other dozen or so schemes he'd concocted over the years that had been stupendously successful at wanking her off. "As compliments go, that one sucked. You're terrible at the game of flattery. Try harder."
She scowled at having been told she was inadequate at something. As he'd expected, that definitely seemed to get under her skin.
Good, he thought, now she'd have to take the game a mite more seriously and would have to dig deep to come up with some way to succeed at the card's requirements. No more flippant backhanded compliments from that sharp tongue of hers.
Feeling confident that he'd manoeuvered her into a corner where she'd have no choice but to genuinely appreciate him, Draco gave her some space and lazily lifted his wand, pointing it at the ceiling. Concentrating on non-verbally changing its color from white to red, then green, then blue, then yellow, and back again to red, he focussed on that task while Granger gathered her thoughts.
Oddly, it seemed as if the magic of the room was struggling to keep up with his commands the faster he cast, because it kept defaulting to white between each colour modification and it seemed to pause a few moments before obeying his will. Were his incessant demands to alter the environment too great on the room's magic, overloading it, or was the room's magic shoving back at him, finding his eccentricity a waste and preferring a minimalist design instead?
Either way, it was a fun challenge and he amused himself with pushing the room's magical limits while his Hermione thought up her next tribute to his greatness.
"All right, I've got another one," she said, breaking the stalemate by taking a seat on the edge of the bed. "You've got the makings of a natural born leader…although you might want to work on learning how to be gracious and respectful to your minions, because you're terrible to them."
He barked a laugh at her audacity.
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