FIC: Here Comes Your Man

[hikorichan]

Title: Here Comes Your Man
Author: Anonymous for now
Prompter: timelady92
Summary: Hermione Granger is thinking of taking a lover. Her Ministry lab-mate and former professor Severus Snape becomes a dark horse candidate.
Prompt: 'Fuck me,‘ she said. 'Gladly,‘ was his answer.
Warnings/Content: Fluffy, smutty romance

Read on AO3 / Read on Livejournal



There is a wait so long;
You’ll never wait so long.

Part One: The Spark that Set the Whole Thing Off
For the last three days, Hermione had been trying to find the error in the code on the screen in front of her. She had run every search at her disposal. She was reduced to dragging her finger across the monitor to examine every line of letters.

Magic made these sorts of errors rare—certainly rarer than the ones she had tackled in university when she was doing her graduate study in molecular biology. Even with the computer, some human was always entering a letter incorrectly. A flick of the wand had obviously zagged here, too. She would find it eventually.

She was researching the genetics of Nonmagical Presentation, of squibdom, to use the outdated term. Squib was an awful word, and she advocated language that upheld the dignity of all creatures, human or not.

There were two types of Nonmagical Presentation, or NP, as it was usually called. About a quarter of cases were the results of physical or psychological trauma. The rest had a genetic component, and those were the cases that made up her research. And now she had been side-lined for three days because someone in the research office had made an error while transcribing the DNA code.

She put her glasses on top of her head and rubbed her temples for a moment. She could use a cup of tea, but it would only make her have to use the loo and waste another few minutes. She glanced over at her lab-mate. He wasn’t brewing today but was conducting a trial in at least twenty small cauldrons. He was squinting in each one and then scratching out notes on endless parchment.

She had inherited him with the space. It was the best lab, and with her last promotion to head of research, she had the right to it. Its previous occupant, an ancient wizard called Dewey Fletcher, had retired, and at the party in his honour, he had pulled Hermione aside.

“It is within your rights to chuck him. I took him on because everyone was putting up a strop. The potions can be…well, not exactly pleasant,” he tapped the side of his nose with one finger and raised his eyebrows. “But he is quiet and fastidious, and better than most I’ve shared with, I must say. They WILL replace him, so perhaps the Death Eater you know…” He delivered the last part in a sing-song cadence.

“He is NOT a death eater! He was acquitted of all…”

“See, my dear, I think you are the perfect colleague to share with old Snape.”

Dewey Fletcher was at least a hundred and twenty, so calling the late forty-something former professor old was a bit rich.

Hermione had never regretted her choice to allow Severus Snape to share the lab with her. His potions were not offensively smelly; in fact, they made her nostalgic for her school days. Snape was working on cures for magical maladies, same as her, although their projects had never overlapped. She was technically his superior, but he never reported directly to her. The eighteen months of their work cohabitation had been without conflict.

They hardly spoke. She greeted him each morning and said goodbye when one of them left; he would nod in response or sometimes ignore her if he was engrossed in work. They took their lunches and tea breaks at different times to allow for more solitude in the lab. She didn’t always associate him with the professor of her adolescence. He had worn his hair short since the end of the war and the recovery from his injuries. He wore dark colours and a black robe, but it wasn’t the dungeon bat special anymore. He had black framed glasses that perched on that nose. He looked like any professional of a certain age, on the handsome side, really. A change of occupation and decreased stress had done wonders for him.

When he first discovered that she would be his new lab-mate, his face had reflected horror and repressed fury; she hadn’t seen him look like that in years. She suspected he was pleasantly surprised as they began to work in the same space. She didn’t speak unless it was necessary, and her work was quiet. She was usually at her computer—their lab was one of the few spaces in the Ministry with electricity and wifi—or conducting her own tests that typically took up much less space than his did.

He was scratching away on the parchment, unaware that she was looking at him. Under his robe that day he was wearing black wool trousers with a light charcoal jumper over a white oxford cloth shirt. His shoes were shined as was typical of his meticulous grooming. His salt and pepper hair was cut close on the sides and longer on top, never greasy or even slightly unkempt.

She smiled and put her glasses back on her nose. She wound her curls on the back of her head and secured them with a stirring rod before giving her attention to the screen before her once again. She grasped a ruler this time, and held it flush to the screen so she could focus intently on each line.

If I don’t find it on this page, I am fetching tea. A trip to the loo would be a pleasant diversion at this point.

She dragged the ruler down slowly, line after line. And then it popped out at her. One tiny, errant, lower-case t in a field of capital letters. “Fuck me!” she said under her breath as she fixed the mistake.

She was preparing to run the program again—she had just pushed the enter key—when he said it.

“Gladly.”

Her head jerked up and over to his side of the lab. He was writing with his quill on the parchment, head down, exactly as he had during the whole process.

Had she imagined it? She must have. But…she had heard it. It hadn’t been loud, but it was clearly his voice, deep and melodious and carrying, as it always had been no matter what the volume.

Gladly.

And then she had to turn back to the monitor. The program was running; whirring gleefully, spitting out bad results, and cataloguing the hits. She couldn’t isolate the gene with these strands, but she could eliminate almost half the possibilities. It was fantastically productive, even with the three-day lag finding the error.

She started to fill in the reports with two columns. All thoughts of tea or anything else were gone as she focused on her project. She was aware when he left, she glanced up and noticed all his cauldrons had been cleaned and returned to his supply shelves.

“Good night, Snape,” she said as she heard him near the door. She didn’t turn to see his response. She stayed until after eight and then shut the computer down for the night, feeling highly satisfied with that day’s work. Her little flat was not connected to the floo network. She apparated up the street from her building, just inside a quiet wizarding neighborhood, just outside the Muggle streets she loved. She dropped her wards and entered, greeted by Crookshanks, who then turned and walked to the kitchen.

Oh, it’s only you.

She prepared his dinner and then made half a chicken sandwich for herself, using leftovers from Sunday dinner at the Burrow. She wasn’t hungry; she never was after a day like that at work, but she knew if she didn’t eat something, she would wake up starving. She ate it standing in the kitchen and washed it down with a half glass of Bordeaux.

She took a quick shower, pulled on a sleep shirt and knickers, and settled in bed with her book, well-written smut and the last of the series, sadly. She would have to go through the bother of finding a new author soon, but at least she was only four chapters in this one. The plucky doctor had gone to the farm-stand to buy tomatoes and had asked the wise beyond his years but still youthful farmer about his use of pesticides. He had left the stand in the care of his younger brother and had taken the plucky doctor back to the green house where, somewhere in the course of showing her different varieties of fertilizer, he had hoisted her on the sturdy table, divested her of her knickers, and was eating her pussy like an absolute champ.

Hermione considered a wank, but she was having a hard time keeping her eyes open. “Lumos,” she whispered and snuggled into her quilt.

She is at work in the staff room, waiting for a brew. Snape is there, too, and he’s smiling at her, quite uncharacteristically, but she doesn’t care. It makes her feel lovely, and she smiles back at him. He reaches out and plucks the stirring rod from her hair, and her curls tumble down. He moves them aside with one hand and kisses her on the neck.

They are running through the streets urgently, holding hands. She can feel his tight grasp. He is protecting her; she can feel his intention as they run. They are not scared; they are just trying to be somewhere else quickly.

They are in bed, in an unfamiliar flat, naked. The walls are bare, there is only this bed covered in white linens. He reaches for her and pulls her on top of him, so she is straddling him. She eases down on his hard cock, and she feels completely full. He still has on his glasses, and she removes them and places them on a table beside the bed she is certain was not there before. He laughs because she still has hers on. He plucks them from her face and they join his on the table, and she realizes the styles are quite similar, except hers are taupe and his are jet black.

His cock is still making her feel full and warm and fantastic. She starts riding him, and he reverently addresses her breasts as if they are his absolute honour to be touching…and kissing…and sucking. She feels a pull in her groin as he takes one of her nipples into his mouth, and she is so close…she rubs her clit against him every time she descends.

She is off him and has moved to the bottom of the bed and has his cock in her mouth. She can taste herself as she licks the underside of it. He moans and repeats her name over and over in his voice. She’s never heard her given name from his mouth, and she takes him fully into the back of her throat and reaches down to touch herself, and she is so close.

They are in the lab, and he has his clothes on but they are more casual than she has ever seen him in. She is sitting on the lab table with her legs spread and her knickers off, and it smells like fertilizer, and his tongue is on her, and his strong hands are keeping her thighs apart, and his tongue is all over her, and she needs a little bit more, so she grounds her quim into his face and that is all it takes. Severus! she calls out and he keeps his face right there and she is coming and coming…and she is in her own bed and her knickers are sodden and she is still shaking.

“Oh my.” She was breathing heavily. She put one bent arm above her head and stretched her legs luxuriously. She checked her wand. It was ten minutes before she needed to get up, but a shower was probably now in order. She stretched and smiled like an idiot before she walked with a bounce to the bath.

What a pleasant way to wake up.

She’d had the occasional Snape fantasy over the years although it wasn’t exactly a standby. She let the spray hit her and she smelled the lovely clean scent of the bar of soap before she started rubbing it on herself.

Wait…that’s a possibility.

She had never considered him a potential candidate, but maybe so. Gladly, he had said.

We shall see, Snape. We shall see.


Part Two: The Proposal

The day of her pleasant awakening, Hermione had to dress for an afternoon of meetings. She tended to default to casual on regular work days; a robe thrown over chinos and a V-neck jumper was her go-to, but she wanted to present a more professional air on administration days. She had a set of formal robes that did the trick adequately, but today she decided on a knee length black pencil skirt, a more body conscious V-neck jumper than she usually wore, a rather lovely ruby coloured one, and black pumps with her nicest black robe over top. She added a string of pearls she had inherited from her Gran, and took time to tame the mess on her head and actually add some lipstick.

Not terrible, Granger.

Her push-up bra was slightly less comfortable than her usual stand-by, but it was worth the minor discomfort, she decided.

He was already working when she arrived.

“Good morning,” she called as she hung her outer cloak on the coat rack in the corner of the lab.
He made a grunty noise in response but didn’t look up.

She sighed and began her work. He took his lunch sharp at noon every day, and returned at twelve-twenty-eight on the dot so she could take hers. He entered silently and took a stasis charm off a cauldron he had been working with all morning.

“I won’t be back from lunch today; I have admin meetings,” she called out. “I’ll probably be back, though, before it’s time to go home.”

He looked up from the cauldron as if to assess whether she was quite ill to have deviated from their routine so noticeably. He knitted his eyebrows at her and then resumed his work.

“Okay, bye.” She called out as she departed.

The second meeting ran long, and he was gone when she came back to tidy her space and grab her cloak.

That was a wasted effort, she thought as she trudged through her routine.

The next week she bought premium biscuits at the supermarket to replace the rather pedestrian ones the Ministry supplied. She had seen him take his tea with a biscuit often. When he returned from his ten A.M. tea break, she was ready.

“Did you see the Jam n’ Creams? Nice.”

He completely ignored her. At eleven fifteen, though, he spoke up. “Jam n’ Cream is more an afternoon choice.”

“I suppose,” she answered brilliantly. That was the extent of the great biscuit discussion of ought nine.

Clearly a more direct approach was called for. And that’s where the Ministry became useful for the first time ever.

Since the war, the wizarding government had been trying to tackle its public relations problem. They had developed several campaigns to promote the image of a warmer, more helpful Ministry. The latest of these efforts was a program called Must Be the Ministry!, a series of posters, billboards, and ads placed in the Prophet, the goal of which was to humanize the Ministry and its employees.

These works of art entailed a portrait of a Ministry employee about his or her day, smiling at the camera. There was one of Harry and Ron in their Aurors’ uniforms eating lunch in their staff room. There was one of the witch who ran the travel office approving the documents of a young family. And there was one of Hermione gazing up from her monitor. See kids, we are up with technology. Beneath each photo, and there were dozens, was the caption, Must Be the Ministry!

Hermione had surreptitiously snapped a photo with her wand of Snape hunched over his parchment one day. She had blown it up to poster size, added the tag line, and hung it in her flat for her New Year’s party. It had taken on a life of its own.

Seamus had copied and altered it the next week to show Snape with a crown, hunching over a jeweled box.

Must Be Epiphany!

It had made the rounds via owl.

Katie Bell had struck next, taking the original and adding little pointy ears and claws to Snape, hunching over a kitten.

Must Be Lycanthropy!

George was responsible for the latest version, the original Snape image hunching over Ron’s wife Susan.

Must Be Adultery!

Hermione was becoming slightly uneasy at the piss being taken at the expense of her lab-mate, but more of the Ministry, she reassured herself.

Another example of the kinder, gentler government was the It’s YOUR Ministry program, which was a series of special after work events that almost every employee ignored until they became compulsory. This month was Pub Night, in which the whole foyer was converted into a tavern with games, pints, pub food, and comfortable seating.

This was only the second one since they had started docking the pay of employees who failed to attend. They’d had to sit through a multi-media presentation of Quidditch Through the Years last month. At least this one enabled a proper, undisturbed buzz.

Hermione planned her outfit around décolletage highlighting once again. She had started with an emerald V-neck, but fearing that was a tad on the nose, switched to classic black. A touch of red lipstick and a pint for courage, and she was ready to make a move.

He was sitting in the back, at a small table by himself, out of the way. They were required to stay for ninety minutes, so she didn’t feel terribly pressured for time. She slid casually into the other seat at his table.

“Hello, Snape.”

He looked less than thrilled to have company. “Granger.”

“Guinness?” she asked indicating his glass.

“Yes.”

“A bit much for me.” She took a drink of her paler beverage.

She had outlined a script but she needed more courage to begin. She sipped her drink and tried to appear as casual as possible. He helped by completely ignoring her.

If they play a song I like, it’s time to act.

Unfortunately, the wizard manning the turntable was a fan of old folk tunes. At this rate, ninety minutes would be up and he would be gone. She felt certain he had an alarm set on his wand.

She took a breath and began. “Are you seeing anyone, Snape?”

“Pardon?” He looked shocked at the question.

“Do you have a girlfriend…or boyfriend?”

“Are you trying to set me up with someone, Granger?”

Yes, with someone near and dear.

“Not exactly.”

“Then why do you want to know?”

“Well, I just…erm.”

“I’m not. Seeing anyone.”

And this was when she needed to push in with the next act, but this part, really all of it, was so difficult for Hermione. It had never gone right. The people she liked never seemed to be interested in her. She was either rejected or had to do the rejecting, which was worse in many ways. This part of her life was a big, fat dud. She suspected this time would be no different, but she had to be brave. It wasn’t as if he could ignore her more aggressively at work every day. She drank a bit more from the glass.

“I’m thinking of taking a lover,” she said, and his eyebrows shot up and then slowly descended.

“What does that have to do with me?”

“I would like the lover to be you.”

“Nonsense.” He rose from his seat and pulled his legs from under the small table. “I am aware, Granger, of the sport you make of me.”

“What? No…what do you…” His image in the lab flashed before her eyes. “Oh. I’m sorry about that. It was stupid. It was directed at the Ministry, but I can see…Please sit down.”

“Stop the contrition routine. You didn’t wound me,” he said defiantly, and of course they hadn’t. It was ridiculous in comparison to what he endured over the years.

“Sit down. I will get us more drinks.”

“That won’t be necessary.” But he did sit. “Surely there is a Weasley that would be a more appropriate candidate.”

“There really is not. Charlie is gay, Ron and Bill are married, and Ginny is too, if I were wired that way… Would you want to sleep with George or Percy?”

“No.”

“So, no.”

“Our work situation would make this fraught.”

“On the contrary. We have a similar work style…”

“So you want to sleep with me because I am efficient?” he said with his familiar snide tone.

“No, I want to sleep with you because I am attracted to you. Your care…attention to detail is just bonus.”

He chuckled, and his face had thawed a few degrees. “Why do you think we would be compatible?”

“Why wouldn’t we be? Do you require something besides what I have?”

He gave her slightly amused look. “Presumably not.”

“Well then.”

“There is typically more nuance to compatibility than coordinating parts.”

“How do you know before you try? Do you find the idea of sex with me repulsive?”

“Not in the least.”

His words had a direct line to her groin and her breath hitched slightly. “Then what’s the problem?”

“What do you like, Granger?” His voice was quiet but intense and she could feel her core quiver.

Is this really happening?

“Well, that’s just it; I don’t know. I haven’t done this before.”

“This?”

“I haven’t done any of it before.”

Part Three: The Negotiation

“I am hardly the man for that job,” he stated firmly, but she can tell there was some disappointment in his declaration.

Damn, I had him.

“Why? You think I am some naïf with no idea about…”

“I think you will want someone nurturing and…instructive.”

She snorted. “You’re not instructive? You will learn to bottle glory…” she did her best Professor Snape.

“I suppose my role here is wave my hand in the air frantically as if I am desperate for a visit to the loo?”

She laughed. “Anyway, I figured we could play it by ear.”

“Just how inexperienced are you, Granger?”

“Is there a secret instruction book I’m not aware of? First you take the…”

“That is not what I…Have you…do you know how you…”

“Are you asking if I’ve had an orgasm, Snape?” she laughed. “I’m almost thirty years old. I should hope…”

“Is that what this is, then? You are running up on an age deadline, and you think you should do this or that before …”

“Yes, that is part of it. But mostly, I just feel like I am missing out on a key aspect of being an adult. I fear I don’t really know anything because I don’t know this.”

“Granger…I’m not sure…”

“I am sure, Snape. I am sure.”

He sighed and took a sip from his neglected Guinness. “Weasley, though? Weren’t you with him after the war?”

“I was with Ron for approximately five minutes after the war. I could tell from the first kiss that it wouldn’t work, but I stayed on for one more.”

“You should no doubt kiss me, then, before you commit…”

She rose slightly and leaned over the table.

“Not here, you daft witch!”

“Sorry.”

“Stop apologizing.” He sighed again. “What about all that time in Muggle university? You mean you never?”

“I thought about it. There were plenty of adequate blokes there.”

“That’s what Muggles are for! Relatively anonymous, not terribly complicated encounters.”

“Is that how you manage?”

“What else is one to do, if he values his privacy?”

His giving her a small insight into his practices made her need flash up again. She wondered if it were tangible? Could he smell her? Was there a low current he could hear? “I understand that. For me, though, it just didn’t seem right to find an available Muggle. I want someone I can be completely honest with; someone I don’t have to hide anything from.”

“I would NOT recommend complete honesty.”

“You know what I mean.”

He looked at her for a moment. “I suppose. I haven’t found it a hindrance to keep some things hidden. It’s different if you want a relationship, of course. Is that what you are after?”

“No! I want what I said. I want a lover with nominal strings and a mutually satisfactory agreement.”

“Such as?”

“Such as no obligations beyond satisfying the other’s sexual needs. If both parties have a reasonably similar libido, there could be an agreement on the frequency of the encounters. If there is a divergence, but otherwise reasonable compatibility, the parties could compromise. Brass tacks: I was thinking Saturday nights with options for a second night weekly if both parties so desire.”

“Where would these liaisons occur?”

“In my flat or in…I have no idea where you live, Snape.”

“I have a home. I do not entertain guests.”

“In my flat then.”

He nodded and they were silent for a few moments before he spoke up again. “What are your expectations for the initial encounter?”

“I have none.”

“Bollocks, Granger. You have thought about this in intricate detail. What is your ideal experience? What have you fantasized about regarding your first experience?”

So much.

“I want someone kind. Someone who would be sensitive to my inexperience. Someone patient.”

“Lupin is dead.”

She felt her face turn crimson. How did you know? “You did ask about fantasy. I would settle for someone not completely selfish.”

“Settle,” he sneered.

“You wouldn’t be in that category, Snape.”

“What category would I be in? Evil potion master? Detention fantasy?”

“No. I was terrified of you then, and detentions were nightmare fodder, not fantasy.”

“Oh yes, Lupin the selfless to the rescue.”

“As you stated, he is quite dead, so there’s not much point in belaboring…”

“If I am not slotted to fulfill mean teacher fetish, then why are we discussing this?” He took a drink and set his glass down with a smack on the table.

“You are attractive, Snape. Is that so hard to believe?”

“Yes.”

“Why? You are intelligent and good looking.” And I could probably come from your voice alone.

“Bollocks.”

“And you have a wicked sense of humour that you don’t reveal often enough.”

He rolled his eyes.

“You apparently have no troubled pulling Muggle women, so why is it so incredulous that I would be similarly interested?”

“You should find someone your own age.”

“I don’t want to. Are you turning me down, then?”

“No.”

Another flood of arousal hit her, which she felt from her cheeks to her toes. “That is splendid,” she said and smiled at him. He did not respond in kind, but his eyes were not hostile. She suspected he was laughing at her in his mind. She flicked her wand. “Only fifteen more minutes of this idiocy, and we can go to my flat?”

He didn’t answer, but she noticed he was running his right middle finger around the rim of his still half-full glass of Guinness in a way that was highly distracting. She uncrossed her legs and wallowed in the pleasant ache between them. She took off the flat on her right foot and extended it to rub against his left leg—the one closest to the wall.

“There is the matter of contraception,” he said after a moment of them staring at each other as she caressed his leg with her foot.

“I take the potion.”

He nodded. “You must be sure,” he said quietly.

“I am. Quite. Have you ever done this? Been someone’s first, I mean?”

He continued to swirl his finger around his glass as he appeared to be thinking. “Not that I am aware of.”

“What was your first time like?” She wasn’t sure how she had become so lacking in decorum, but she supposed it was all on the table now.

“Brief.”

“How old were you?”

“Younger than thirty,” he scoffed.

“Thank you very much,” she said, mock-offended and ran her toe up his leg again. He was looking directly into her eyes, and it felt as if they were alone in the crowded, noisy room. “I think the longer you wait…the more importance the whole thing takes on. I know I should have just gotten it over with years ago, but…”

Go on, his eyes said.

“But…I don’t know. I am ready now, and I am very happy you will oblige me.”

He snorted.

“What?” she said.

“Oblige you? Granger…” He shook his head slightly.

“Hermione,” she said. He was still looking straight in her eyes. He hesitated to respond. “Hermione,” she repeated.

“Hermione, it would not be an obligation to take you to bed.”

“No?”

“No. It would be the highlight of my…” he stopped mid-sentence and seemed to be searching her eyes for guidance. You are not engaging in an elaborate ruse? “If you truly want this, I will participate happily, cheerfully, willingly, readily, eagerly, freely, and with pleasure. I will oblige you,” he said with a lightness of spirit she had never heard from him, “gladly.”

“I think we can go now…it’s about two minutes ‘til. We’ve put in our time,” she said breathily.

He was already on the way to the robe rack. He pulled his own and then hesitated a moment before handing hers over. “I believe this is yours.”

“It is.”

She put it on and followed him out to the apparition area just outside the Ministry. “Do you want to side along?” she asked. He inquired as to where they were going, and she told him. He disappeared with a pop. She followed.

She landed up the street from her house. It was a quiet night, and no one was about. “This way,” she said, and headed up the street.

They had gone about ten paces before he seized her hand and pulled her back to him. He enveloped her with one arm and pressed his mouth against hers. His eyes were closed, and she felt awkward and gangly at first, but she closed her eyes, too, and allowed him to press her closer. Even with his mouth closed, it was the most intense kiss of her life. She couldn’t stop from whimpering against his mouth, and he opened his slightly and flicked her slowly with his tongue. She felt herself weak against him, but he held her firmly around the waist, and she opened her mouth and offered him her tongue, which he accepted immediately. He kissed her like this for a full thirty seconds before he pulled away slightly and looked at her.

She was completely breathless and wondered if he would need to carry her the rest of the way.

“Yes, I think this will work,” he said. “Lead on.”


Part Four: The Deed(s) in Question

She led him by the hand up her steps and quickly lowered the wards. Once inside, she took off her robe and hung it on the tree in the entry way. “Drink?”

“No,” he said. He removed his own robe and hung it and then turned to her and pulled her jumper off. She raised her arms to assist him.

“Thou V-necked temptress of blackness,” he recited as he hung it beside the robes on the coat tree. “Thou art just as alluring in emerald or garnet.” He turned back to her and enveloped her while plunging his face into her cleavage offered to him via black push-up bra.

Totally not a wasted effort.

“I didn’t realize you noticed,” she gasped, and he reached behind her and unclasped one and then two hooks. “Oh,” she said, as he hung it with the jumper. He chuckled against her skin before taking her right nipple into his mouth and swirling it around on his tongue before her sucked it in. “OH!” she cried. He mimicked his action with his fingers on her left breast.

She had been aware that her breasts were sensitive when she was aroused, but this was truly a revelation. He had one arm firmly around her waist, one at her breast with his mouth and she was in his thrall completely and hurtling toward climax through this alone. She had one hand on his back and one on the side of his head, her fingers dragging through his hair as she struggled internally whether to give him control or try to hold back. Without thinking, she reached down and unbuttoned her trousers and tore at the zip so she could finger herself and find some relief. He sensed what she was doing and put his own hand there before she could place hers. He palmed her, and his fingers felt for her wet opening, and then he dragged them up so he was touching her clitoris. One swirl of his finger in time with him sucking her breast and she was coming and limp and against the wall.

He stilled his hand slowly as she rode the peak and then started to come down. His sucking became less intense kissing, but he continued to hold her tightly in one arm. She had her head thrown back and she raised it and took his face in her hands and kissed him deeply in awe and appreciation. He took the finger that had been in her knickers and brought it to her mouth to suck between kisses. She tasted sweet and tart on him, and she felt her body ramping up again.

She began to both unbutton his shirt and lead him into the bedroom. When they were there and standing at the edge of the bed, she flicked on the lamp with her wand and then dimmed it. She lowered herself to her knees and began working on his placket, buttons, of course, about fifteen of them. He was hard under it all; she had felt him as they pressed together, and she was ready for this next discovery. She pulled his trousers free and discovered steel blue boxers, straining to contain him. She pushed them down carefully and looked at his cock. It was large and rather intimidating, but also beautiful in its own way. Perfect and hers right then.

She stroked it gently, a bit in awe, and he groaned. He was bracing himself with one hand at the bedpost and one at her shoulder, running his fingers through her curls as she explored him carefully. She lifted his cock slightly and ran her tongue on the underside, as she had imagined herself doing. Reality was better, though. His skin had a pleasant taste, and there was an electric charge she hadn’t anticipated. When she reached the top, she licked around the head and then put it in her mouth, sucking the moisture at the tip and slowly taking his length into her mouth to her throat as far as it would go.

The hand in her hair tightened and she could hear him breathing heavily. Encouraged, she let her tongue explore as she sucked him. When his breath became more ragged, he gently pulled away, caressing her curls.

“Take off your trousers. Leave your knickers on. Lie on the bed.”

She followed his directions. Her black cotton knickers were rather ruined by then, but she didn’t care. He pulled off his shirt and the rest of his clothes, stopping a moment with his shoes. He lay his glasses on the nightstand, next to hers, and then climbed in beside her on the bed. He kissed her and started touching her from the top of her shoulders, this time gently, non-insistently, unlike how he had been when they first arrived at her flat. He lightly stroked his way down from the top of her chest to her breasts and then belly and then lower, past the waistband of her knickers and still lower with his fingers caressing her, swirling them around the opening of her pussy, which was practically clinching them in place. She breathed in and out, trying to calm down and just feel.

He started lowering himself, following the same journey with his mouth this time, kissing her everywhere, both breasts, down to her belly. He kissed in a row just above her knickers before removing them slowly and then taking the tops of her legs in his hands and separating them before lowering himself further so his mouth was at her core.

He slowly opened her with his fingers while using his tongue above. She could feel him insert a finger inside her. He stopped for a moment. “Is this okay?”

She laughed, just a little. “If you’re looking for a maidenhead, I’m afraid that ship sailed a long time ago. It’s been an intense solitary pursuit, you know?”

“Just tell me if you are uncomfortable with any of this,” he said, ignoring her declaration.

“I’m not…uncomfortable.” She could be, she thought, if she had any self-consciousness at all, this would be the time it would be on high alert, but she tried to turn off thinking, the bane of her existence sometimes. It felt like nothing she had ever experienced by herself. It wasn’t all about reaching a destination, and sometimes he didn’t hit the right spots, but it was its own process, and she felt that it would be better if she could leave her thoughts behind for once in her life.

He added a second finger and kept pressure around her clitoris with his tongue. “Oh, yes,” she whispered, but loudly enough for him to hear. She felt another wave right there, and just then he moved up, keeping his fingers in place.

“Ready for this?” he asked.

“Yes. Please.”

He moved so he was hovered on top of her, balanced on his elbows. He put his head down for a kiss again, and she tasted herself on him again, and she sucked his tongue fully into her mouth. She could feel him move his cock against her pussy, and then she felt tip slip inside.

“Yes, please,” she repeated, more insistent this time. He pushed forward and she felt full, but not in pain. It was like nothing she had experienced from her little toy box under the bed; it was warm and alive and his skin was on hers. She opened her legs wider.

“Okay?”

“Yes!”

He began to move, slowly at first. She was trying to stay present, but her mind was yelling finally, finally, finally. Almost immediately, she was on the edge again. She shifted slightly so he was hitting the right spot, and he responded by placing his hand down on her to provide more friction.

“Oh, yes!” She was hopping from stone to stone, each time closer to another release, so very close. “Yes, right there,” she gasped, and he thrust in time with his fingers just perfectly, and she was off again, every nerve in her body lit and cresting and “Ooooooooh, YES!”

He gave her a moment and then started again. She put her arms around his shoulders and held him so close. He brought his face in to kiss her and then buried it in her curls and moaned as he came.

He fell back on the other side of the bed, slightly out of breath, as she was, too. She turned her head to face him, and he took a moment with his eyes shut, and then turned to her. She had wide eyes and her hand over her mouth.

“What?” he said softly in that voice that she didn’t think she would ever be able to hear without associating it with all this.

“That was fantastic! Thank you…can I call you Severus in bed?”

“Only in bed.” His eyes were amused and kind.

“That was wonderful, Severus. Thank you.”

“No need to thank me.” He turned his eyes away from her, but he linked a finger with hers. They lay quietly, connected by their smallest fingers intertwined for a few moments.

“Would you like that drink now?”

“Yes.”

“I have some decent red wine.”

“That would be fine.”

She shuffled out of bed and grabbed a clean pair of knickers out of her bureau, pulling them on, trying not to fall. She had a pretty, sheer, floral-patterned silk dressing gown her mother had bought her in Paris their last trip there. She pulled that on, too, and tied the belt at her waist. She grabbed her glasses and then grinned when he came into sharper focus.

“Awfully dressed to walk into the kitchen.”

“Crookshanks is in there.”

“You can’t be naked in front of your familiar?”

“No! He thinks I’m a respectable woman.” She walked out with a small flounce and shut the door behind her. She practically danced into the kitchen, giddy with joy. She poured the wine into her favourite glasses, one of the very few household goods she had saved from her childhood home. They had etched, wide bowls and a gold band at the top of the stem. She walked with them carefully back to the bedroom, ignoring Crooks’s prominent side-eye.

When she returned, he was sitting up in bed, with her afghan draped over him. He had put his glasses back on and was thumbing through the reading material on her nightstand, a large stack that included the smutty novel, the latest on genome mapping, a history of the Saxons, feminist theory written by a nineteenth century witch, and a travel guide to the Canadian Maritimes.

“A little something for every mood,” she explained and handed him a glass. “Cheers.”

He clinked his glass against hers and took a drink. “Are you planning a holiday?” he indicated the travel guide.

“Not seriously. I am chained to the computer until I find the gene.” Snape had taken two weeks in May, she remembered. “Where did you go last spring?”

“Spain, Portugal, Morocco.”

“Sounds like paradise.”

“It was.”

“Do you travel every year?”

“Twice a year, usually. First week in January and then in the late spring.”

“Did you travel back in the school days?”

“Before it became dire. It kept me sane. Reasonably.” He finished his wine and laid his glass on the nightstand. In one motion, he scooped her up in one arm and brought her to him so she was at his lap. She swung a leg over him to straddle his waist.

She finished her drink in one gulp and placed it next to his.

He vanished her knickers wordlessly, and her head whipped around to find them; she assumed they made it into the hamper by the wardrobe. “Your charm work…” she said in amusement and slight awe.

“Don’t tell me that wasn’t the first one perfected in the Gryffindor common room.”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“Hmmmm,” he said with a smirk and adjusted her so she was sitting against his half-hard cock, which was warm and seemed to have a mind of its own as it hardened against her. He took off his glasses and laid them on the nightstand.

“Wow,” she whispered.

He opened her dressing gown but left it on and ran his fingers through the silk. “I’m thinking of taking a lover,” he whispered with a little smirk.

“What does that have to do with me?” She leaned in and kissed him lightly on the mouth.

He slid her glasses down her nose and placed them next to his. “I’m certain we have corresponding parts.”

“That’s not all it takes to...OH!”

He was moving his hips slowly so the underside of his cock rubbed against her clitoris exquisitely.

“I suspect it will not be a problem.” He lifted her gently up and placed himself right at her opening. “Okay?” he whispered.

“Yes.”

“If you are sore, we will stop.”

“Please don’t.”

He eased her down and then brought his hands back up to her face and kissed her. She felt full again, but not sore. She squirmed a little bit to find a comfortable spot and a good, slow rhythm. There was no urgency this time. They kissed slowly. He ran his hands up and down the sides of her open gown and then took her breasts in each hand and then kissed her neck and the side of her face. He gripped her around the hips firmly and then adjusted them on the bed so he could go in deeper. She arched her back and moaned.

Why did I wait this long?

They shifted again, and she was on her back and he was upright in front of her. He took one of her legs and rested it at his shoulder so she was open to him. He started circling and rubbing her with his fingers, not hard enough for her to come right then, just bringing her a little bit closer with every thrust. “I could do this forever,” he said, and his voice worked with his hands and cock to push her further.

“Do you like this?” she asked, brazenly trying to make him speak again.

“Like it? It is the most exquisite…you are the most…you are the…you drive me mad, witch!” With that he put two fingers in her mouth, and she had no choice but to suck them, rolling her tongue up and down and then sucking them in as deeply as she could. “Oh, Merlin’s…” he gasped. He removed his wet fingers and put them right on her clit and rubbed it hard as he thrust with increasing speed.

Everything in her mind shut down except want and need and finally release, and she could hardly hear herself as she came and called out, “Fuck, Severus, YES!”

Then he came with a throaty roar, and she felt him this time fill her up as he thrust each burst of come into her. She clamped her hand over her mouth because she wanted to laugh in glee and delight, and she was afraid he would think she was laughing at him.

This time, instead of rolling off her with propriety, he just collapsed on top of her, and she caressed his back as he came down. She kissed the side of his face that was pressed against her, and after a moment, he turned his head and kissed her mouth rather tenderly. He disentangled himself so his weight was no longer pinning her down, but he stayed at her side pressed against her.

“I am forty-nine years old, Granger.”

“Yes? Do you think that matters to me?”

“It matters to me! I fear you may kill me.”

She poked him in the side. “I think you will be fine.” She propped herself up on her elbow and kissed his shoulder. He rolled over to face her and propped his head with his hand, mimicking her position. “Do you think this arrangement will work for you?” she asked him, unable to hide a grin that was taking over her face. “Saturday nights and others if needs arise?”

“The arrangement,” he laughed at her and took her leg so it straddled his hip, pulling her close to him. “I will be here gladly whenever you arrange for me to be.”


Part Five: The End of The Arrangement

The arrangement lasted less than a fortnight. By then, Snape was staying at Hermione’s flat more nights than not. He was transferring his possessions piece by piece, and by September they were living together by any standard save legal documentation.

Their work relationship remained virtually the same. Occasionally, Hermione would say something in the middle of the work day such as, “Crooks is looking a bit thin. Perhaps more protein in his diet?” And Severus would nod and grunt in response. Or Severus would say, “The Bunting Estate has flats available. Two-bedroom mostly.” And Hermione would respond, “Should we arrange a tour this weekend?” And Severus would nod and grunt.

They took their meals and breaks separately at work, but breakfast and dinner together most days. They weren’t hiding anything, but Hermione’s friends were busy with their own lives and missed this development in hers. People at work noticed nothing different.

On the third Sunday in November, they stayed in bed all day. Hermione had found the gene that was responsible for NP on Thursday, and she had spent the next forty-eight hours writing her paper and preparing the research to present to the Head of Healing and her committee, and then perhaps to the wizarding community at large, if the committee chose to verify her results. She was exhausted, but it was the best kind of exhaustion that comes from years of hard work being successfully completed.

They had found a larger flat the weekend before, and they were planning to move in the next week. Severus was selling his house; he provided scant details, and Hermione didn’t ask. The new flat was lovely and airy and had plenty of room for the two of them and her creature.

So they had spent the whole day in bed, sleeping some, and not sleeping some, but not talking much. Around noon, Severus had declared himself “Weeks shy of fifty and entirely too old for this,” but after a nap, he rallied.

Around three-thirty, Hermione was afraid her stomach would attempt to eat itself if she didn’t put some food in it soon. She began to attempt to motivate them both to forage at the mutually admired little red-checked tablecloth Italian place a block from her flat.

There was five minutes of daylight left, and the last string of orange light was hitting the bed in a thin beam. Severus reached over beside the bed and fumbled with his trouser pocket before scooping Hermione closer to him and placing an emerald cut light amethyst set in platinum on her left ring finger.

She took him in her arms. “I think so. Yes.”

Five hours later, he made fettucine alfredo for them using items he found in her pantry.

On Wednesday, December twenty-third, after work, they walked together to the registry office at the Ministry and asked the official on duty to marry them. They left immediately for a two-week holiday in Quebec and the Maritimes. It was frightfully cold, so they didn’t leave their hotel rooms often.

Two days before their return, owls flew throughout the UK wizarding communities with little photo cards featuring Severus hunched over his parchment in the lab, and behind him with one hand resting on his shoulder, Hermione in a white V-neck jumper and a little veil over her curls, and the words Must be matrimony! below.