Disclaimer: I own nothing except the scene I have put these characters in. Thanks for the inspiration to write this, I had never thought of these characters together until I found the trove of treasures on this site.

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They stood facing each other, finally no desk between them. A quick glance might have expected to see wands drawn rapidly, and a duel to begin, but that would have only been from a quick glance. Because if one took the time to look more closely, their expressions were not those of malice or challenge, but of something altogether different: contemplation.

She was studying his face, a face she had stared at almost every day for the last six years, unless you counted the time on the run with Harry. His aquiline nose betrayed a Roman ancestry, the narrow jaw and the nearly black eyes, spoke of one more European, not at all incongruent on his face. His black hair, worn long, just brushing his shoulders in a single length that obscured much of his face when he leaned over a student's desk, allowing him the privacy to present any menacing sort of expression he wished to accompany the comments of ridicule or derision at one failed experiment or another. The secrecy made him even more terrifying to the students who surrounded the unfortunate target as they painted in their minds, the countenance to accompany the words. She had always thought it would look better tied back in a leather lace.

He examined her face just as intently. Six years ago he paid her no mind, a round faced first year witch with unruly hair and know-it-all eyes that had seemed to challenge him at every turn. Oh certainly, many of his colleagues had seen them differently; as enthusiastic, even as powerful. But he hadn't, not then, and he had spent a great deal of time convincing himself that she felt nothing for him but disgust, and that had made it easier to hate her, and ignore her unless absolutely necessary. But all of a sudden, he had seen something different in them; now that the war was won, all were safely home, subterfuge revealed, and grief dealt with. She stood before him now and her face looked at him with questions, and he felt the stirring of something long forgotten: hope.

He had not realized that it had been there, and that it had simply been lying dormant for years, not until this very moment, and he found himself terrified by the revelation, though it was a simple enough matter to disguise it in his practiced neutral expression of disinterest; but he could not disguise his eyes.

She dared to gently raise her wand hand to him, empty, and she brushed her fingertips down the side of his face, like the tips of feather quills, he thought to himself as he shuddered involuntarily. She had brushed his hair back off his shoulders. Lily had done that he remembered as he closed his eyes for a moment to let the pleasure of that moment wash over him. He opened them again as he felt those same fingers run across his lips, resting there, just a moment too long, hoping perhaps for a response. When there was none she drew them back under his chin. She was nearly as tall as he was by then, and she wasn't watching where her hand was tracing, she simply kept holding his eyes. He wondered when it was that she had turned into the woman who stood before him.

"Miss Grainger, I think you had best stop what you are doing now." The confidence of the words he spoke belied by the depths in his eyes.

"I'll stop when you tell me that that is what you really want Professor."

"Miss Grainger, your impertinence continues to amaze me." Her fingers were still moving across his skin, and it was becoming harder to control the desires he felt rising in him. "Your continued displays indicate to me a complete lack of respect on your part for my position as your instructor. Do you think so little of me that you cannot fathom that I could have more to teach you? You don't know everything Miss Grainger, much as you likely believe you do."

"On the contrary Professor," her voice was deeper and more rhythmic than he had ever noticed before, "I hope that you have a great deal more you can teach me." His hands began to shake. "And you have not yet told me that you really want me to stop."

He took a deep breath, needing to calm himself, needing to find a center for the words that he would speak next. Because he knew that once uttered, his choice would be made, and could not be undone. Another deep breath, her fingers were curling around his neck, and he felt lost, which was terribly foreign to him.

"No Hermione, I suppose I haven't asked you to stop, have I?"

The smile that lit her face was brilliant, and he found that it made him happy to see it, though he continued to fight the urges within to express his true emotions just then. He looked over her again. Her hair was long and loose, falling in soft waves down her back; her face had become thinner after the ordeal they had all been through, and because of the inevitable changes of her progression to woman from child. Her chest was heaving just slightly under her robes, and he noted that he could just see the swells her breasts made against the black fabric. There was no trace of the girl there any longer, and the question crossed his mind as to what she was wearing under her robes, and he found he could not push the desire to discover it away.

"Professor?" Her fingers were curling in his hair.

"You will have to stop calling me that Hermione."

"Why?"

"Because it will no longer be proper when we are alone, and I will need everything with you to be proper, considering what we are about to do." He felt her fingers pause in their ministrations.

His words had made her heart feel light; she too had spent so much of her time at the school hating him, but yet respecting his abilities, if not his methods. She had only come to realize that her feelings were changing as the full truth had come out after the war. Had she known before the risks he had taken, how he had shouldered blame and fury to help save them all, and how he had done it without care for his own soul and feelings, perhaps she would have wakened earlier to the noble man who stood before her. She felt her own breath pause as he finally brought one of his hands up to touch her, to slide gently behind her neck, and to cup the back of her head in his delicate touch. Had he been a muggle she would have pictured him as an artist or musician, with the dexterity in his long fingers. His choice of potions had been the perfect one; his precision was without match. He coxed her face towards his and very softly, and carefully he brushed her lips with his. She closed her eyes and allowed her body to simply feel.

Part of his mind was screaming at him at what a fool he was being; she was so much younger than he, she was his student, she was… so soft. The kiss was brief, but he could not pull his hand away from her now that he had finally touched her.

"Teach me?" Her words were barely a whisper.

"You are incorrigible." But he brought his mouth down on hers again, this time with more force, and with more passion; passion that she matched in her own pressure against him. He parted her lips with his tongue and sought to taste her, she reciprocated in kind and he felt his knees suddenly weaken. She drew her body close to press against his, and for a moment he worried that she would be able to feel his rising physical need for her, but the worries passed quickly as she ground her hips against him, seeking just such a response.

When the kiss ended he had to speak. "What do you want from me Hermione?"

"I should think I had made it obvious." She spoke into his shoulder where she had curled her head. She was nipping at his neck.

"Tell me, out loud, I need to hear it please." He was unaccustomed to pleading for anything. If he could not have it himself, by his own devices, he had always felt it not worth having, certainly not worth begging for. At least until now, he craved her answer.

"I want you to touch me. And I want to touch you." She took the very resolve from his body.

"And?" He could barely whisper the word.

"And I want you to make love to me." Every thread-like hold he still had on his previous self snapped, and he was falling, and all he could do was pull her body into his, and kiss her roughly, giving her the answer to the request.

Her hands reached for his robes, seeking to pull the fasteners loose. He stopped her with both his hands.

"Not here."

"Where?"

"Come back to my rooms."

"How can we manage it without being discovered?"

"I know a great many passages around the school, will you take my hand?"

She did, following him down the spiral passage from his classroom to his office, and then through another door she had never before noticed.