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Title: Perfect Potter
Author: me
Pairing: H/D
Rating: R
Summary: Andy likes his life, his job... and his coworker, Harry Potter. Part three of the Arrangement series.
Disclaimer: The HP characters don't belong to me. Andy does.
Thanks to Coffee for the beta!
Also posted on AO3 and skyehawke.
...
The Arrangement
An Evening in August
Perfect Potter
He was a perfect male specimen, Harry Potter was. Andy didn’t have a problem with cataloguing each and every example of that perfection either. Just now, with his shirt sleeves rolled up to bare tanned, mud-streaked forearms, collar folded just haphazardly enough to bring attention to the fact that Harry wore ‘haphazard’ like a second skin, and dark hair ruffling into a continuous flow of obsidian silk, Harry Potter was more than enough reason for Andy to let his mind drift slowly out across the barrow downs and forget the map he held quite completely.
And that was saying nothing for the well-toned shoulders beneath that shirt, and the carelessly bronzed body. Andy knew it was there; he’d seen it, or at least the top half of it, on scorching days when the sun baked the clothing right off of any intelligent person’s frame. Andy dreamed of getting Harry naked three times a week, and shagging… He smirked to himself, finally looking down at the map, smoothing it with his fingers. Shagging or being shagged by Harry would put his dreams to shame, because Harry was the one thing that most other delectable types were not: he was caring.
“Andy, you certain that hole is over here?”
He looked up and found Harry standing, cutting a lean, steady shadow against the rolling hills of green behind. The sunlight dove through the speedily moving clouds, painting light all over his body like water.
“It’s right under your feet, Harry. Should be.” He didn’t need to consult the map.
Harry glanced at the towering blocks and henges of stone to Andy’s left, running a hand through his hair to clear his eyes. Solid pine green, those eyes.
Gods. It was time to stop acting the idiot before his chance ran away from him. Harry liked men, Andy knew that. Had made a point of knowing that. And there was something very blessed in that fact, a miracle that Andy had not failed once to give ritual thanks for.
He could see Harry counting the feet from the edge of the stone circle with his eyes. Ticking them off on slender fingers. Harry’s eyes flickered shut, then opened, and his lips parted, letting the faintest of whispers free. The grass at Andy’s feet pricked upright and then bowed out away from the stones in one muted sweep. Andy’s skin crawled at the touch of Harry’s magic. Something deep within the stone circle shifted, a grinding of the soul, and Harry looked down.
“Bloody hell,” he hissed and jerked his wand free. The curse’s first wave rolled out of the earth directly under Harry’s feet. Andy jumped, muttered counter spells to contain the spread of it, but Harry’s eyes flashed in the rippling sunlight; his wand shot out, and the magic gave a primal groan, the sound of cavernous earth, and unwillingly wisped away.
The hole looked frail and normal amidst the tall grass. Peaceful again.
Harry met Andy’s eyes and grinned, lopsidedly and the cause for Andy’s sudden lightheadedness. “Wasting Hex. Lousy one, too.” Harry raised his arm and beckoned to the small group of Wizard guides waiting on the outskirts of the stone circle. “Give us a few minutes to get out of here and then tell them they can send the Muggles back in,” he called.
Merlin, but Andy wanted that man. Had for ages. And Harry Potter was just the nice enough sort to give him what he wanted, if he didn’t insist on proving himself the complete and utter fool by not requesting it in the first place.
“You want to get a drink, Harry?” Andy said before he could find another reason to stop himself. A boyfriend, perhaps. There was no way someone who looked the way Harry did could be alone.
Harry flashed him that grin again. The wind dropped and his hair slid down rakishly over his forehead, parting just enough to bare the slight, unforgettable scar. “My pub, if you don’t mind.”
* * *
‘Harry’s pub’ was The Dragon’s Scales, a tiny, lopsided hole in the wall in Burford’s equally tiny Wizarding district. ‘Andy’s pub’ was located further afield in Tetbury, and usually was so crowded by this time of night that it was just as well Harry insisted and had his way.
Harry drank long from his pint of ale, and laughter spilled over from the nearest table, which was crowded with men and women and cloaks and empty mugs. Andy saluted them and Harry let out a pleased chuckle before leaning forward on his elbows. “You know, what I think? That hex was the Jamesons’. The thing had their smell all over it.”
“Maybe the Ministry won’t be such a load of arses this time and let them out for good behavior.” Andy leaned in a little as well, feeling a thorough and pleasant kinship with Harry, if he did say so himself. “Bill’s going to be livid.” And you’ve no idea how radiant you make me feel. It didn’t exactly fit in with the current topic, but it might, in a few beers’ time. Andy knew with a strange sense of levity that tonight would be the night he would speak. There was no reason not to. Harry seemed to be the last flawless, unattached man.
Really, it wasn’t as farfetched as one might think. Harry’s choice of employment took him out of his home in London staggeringly often, and though Andy wasn’t fool enough to believe that Harry had been without the occasional lover, a long-term relationship might very well be an impossibility.
Unless one could match such a strange and rigorous schedule. Thus, it was very likely that Andy was the best candidate. His job took him everywhere that Harry went.
Andy’s drinking partner lifted his glass in agreement of his last statement. “But it’ll give him something to do besides pounding the ancient roads of Egypt for the fifty-third time, yeah?”
He ought to speak now. Ought to ask Harry for another drink tomorrow back in London, maybe accompany it with a dinner. A film. A week. A month. Harry Potter had such an easy way about him, as if one could say anything and be certain of complete seriousness in response. He had a feeling that giving voice to his innermost yearnings for Harry’s ears would never result in ridicule.
A laughing, very inebriated couple stumbled their way through the door into the night, letting in a freezing bluster of wind before the heavy oak banged shut once more. When the bell tinkled merrily again almost immediately, Andy thought of missing scarves and misplaced coats left at tables, and looked up to witness the cheerful retrieval of said items. But it wasn’t the couple who walked into the pub.
A man in a thick coat the colour of Cotswolds clouds stepped inside, brushing something invisible from his shoulder with one expensively gloved hand. His blond hair gusted in the wind, so light as to look silver in the firelight. He was tallish, clothed in finer threads than the town of Burford witnessed on a regular basis, and next to the gaily chattering off-work group cluttered into the establishment, it was especially apparent. Andy had a brief moment of realising that he’d seen this man somewhere, and then a moment of deeper, more instinctual recognition from somewhere further back, but the context felt wrong.
The newcomer removed each glove with simple precision, and Andy felt his heart beat quickly against his ribs. Very handsome indeed. “I think that bloke’s eyes match his coat,” he said before thinking, because there was really nothing more arresting than the soft ash of the man’s irises. Andy would get to analyzing the rest in a moment.
Harry swiveled on his stool and took in the new arrival, and if there had been any doubt left about his sexuality, it died a quick, quiet death there in the haze of the crowded pub.
Andy had to physically draw his eyes away from his co-worker. He frowned curiously at the doorway instead. “He’s not a local.”
“No, he certainly isn’t.” Harry’s voice was quiet, and then it filled with a warmth Andy had been dreading since the moment he’d met the man: “Brightens a whole bloody room, doesn’t he?”
The way Harry’s eyes glowed… Andy sighed and looked down at his pint. Wasn’t possible. The blond man moved with the grace of a cat, cinder-grey coat pristinely sweeping against long legs in tailored black trousers as he sorted his way past the tables and drinking patrons toward the bar. His face was sharp and lithe, in that aching, ruthless way that hurt the most because things that were that ethereal weren’t meant to be grasped by mortal men. Couldn’t be more different from Harry’s earthy lines and comfortable charm. There was disdain in the way the man moved, but it was faint, as if it were always ready to swing to the surface, but not quite allowed its full freedom.
Halfway through the room, the blond man caught sight of them, and his step slowed, then quickened again.
“Just get in?” Harry asked once he was close enough, and there was a certain quality to his voice, as if it were meant only for the man he was currently addressing. As if it should have gone unnoticed by everyone else in the room.
The man gave a single nod, and Andy was struck again by that sense of familiarity. “Cheeks are red,” the newcomer said in reply. His voice was as calm as his gait. He lifted a hand and touched one finger to Harry’s flushed cheek.
“It’s windburn.” Harry turned on the stool again and graced Andy with one of those grins. “Andy—Andrew, rather. Andrew Somerset, Draco Malfoy.”
Oh yes, well, that explained it fairly succinctly. There wasn’t a wizard alive who didn’t know about Harry Potter, of course, but it felt much more elitist to know of the infamous surviving Malfoy. Andy surveyed his counterpart, and thought about extending a hand.
Draco Malfoy’s eyes slid over him, and Andy could see the sharp awareness in them. This one knew what he was thinking, or could guess very accurately. The tiniest of flashes quickened those mercurial irises. Malfoy nodded, letting his lips fall into a half-smirk.
“Pleasure,” the man said in a perfectly poised voice.
Andy nodded and smiled back as well as he could.
Harry’s delectable voice sounded again. “Have any trouble finding the place?”
Draco Malfoy sniffed dismissively. “Trust you to locate the most cramped, Muggle-like pub in all of Wizardom. Do you know, I think I actually missed this one back when I was in my formative, impressionable years.”
Harry snickered, and Andy looked at him, blinking. He’d never heard that particular laugh from his coworker before. It gave him a slightly lewd edge; if Andy had known it existed before tonight, he might not have waited so long. “And exactly which years were your impressionable ones anyway?”
Malfoy’s only answer was a secretive smirk. Secretive to Andy, anyway; he doubted Harry was excluded from the back-story. Indignation fluttered weakly inside him, and he just… had to know.
“Visiting him at work? That’s rather nice. You know, I think I’ve seen you before.”
Malfoy’s gaze settled briefly on him again. A nod.
“Didn’t know you were with Harry, though. How long have you two been…” Andy gestured, maintaining what he assumed was a pleasant smile. “Together?”
Harry’s eyes lifted to Malfoy’s face. His hand reached. Fingers closed around their slender, paler counterparts and squeezed. “Going on four months, now.”
Malfoy’s lips curved upward, and one brow lifted. “Potter can be a real romantic sot about it,” he countered easily. But Andy did not miss the brief grip of his hand around Harry’s.
So Harry was managing a steady relationship. Four months was a long time. And if he truly thought back, the timeline coincided particularly with a general brightening of Harry’s mood. Not that Harry Potter hadn’t always been genial. Andy figured there were two ways a man could go, having been through what Harry had, and Harry’d chosen the less stressful of them, definitely. His sense of humour and restful demeanor had always been a major selling point. It was just that he’d been… more at ease in the past four months than Andy could remember in years.
“Well, it took us a while,” Harry said, and there was a deep, painful fondness around his eyes. “There’s history here you wouldn’t believe.”
Andy had a feeling it wasn’t that sort of ‘on-and-off,’ the sort where one such as Andy Somerset might manage a year of glorious heaven in between the ‘on.’
He caught Malfoy’s extraordinary eyes again, fixed on him. There was no real malice there. Just an awareness, plain and open. If Malfoy couldn’t read his emotions, Andy was no curse-breaker. Malfoy certainly knew who he had here in Harry. He knew exactly who he had. All the trappings included.
Andy watched Harry’s fingers play with the hem of Malfoy’s sleeve, and drift over the back of his hand. Lingering at his thumb, pressing the knuckle with a fleeting stroke. Harry couldn’t seem to keep from touching the other man. It was a bitter, bitter draught to swallow, somehow. Andy felt the blush creeping over his face and focused on his pint, suddenly very aware of the blond’s shrewd gaze. He’d no idea if it was truly turned on him. But he didn’t feel candid enough to risk it at the moment.
The comforting lilt of Harry’s voice went on, shaping sounds that should have been words in Andy’s ears. He simply liked to listen to Harry speak, and wondered rather unexpectedly whether Malfoy fed the same addiction.
Maybe he was just slow, but his mind was still back in the reality where Harry Potter was single. Andy shook his head unobtrusively as Harry finished up a carefree relation of the hex they’d pulled out of the ground earlier that day.
“…long day. Amateur curse, but we were up too bloody early. Andy had to pry me with coffee.”
“You don’t drink coffee,” Malfoy said blandly. Harry’s face twisted, and it hit Andy that he was fighting a smile with every ounce of his being.
“All the more reason it worked. For a while, anyway.”
Andy did have to smile at that. It was true; Harry’s buzz had been short-lived at best. But the tremour in the blond’s eyes as he gazed at Andy’s coworker was more than enough to sober Andy up. A pale hand lifted, as if it would settle on Harry’s back. But Malfoy merely leaned forward and turned Harry’s empty pint glass, as if perusing it. Harry stretched one arm over his head, cocking his elbow lazily.
“What time is it, anyway? Half nine?”
Andy glanced over the bar. “Earlier.”
“Feels later,” Harry muttered, hiding a yawn.
“You’ll forgive me,” Malfoy said suddenly with a composed smile, “if I drag Harry away. Our schedules haven’t been so cooperative lately.”
“Touring tomorrow.” Harry stood with that same loopy grace. “Would you believe he’s never been to Stonehenge?”
Andy thought about it for all of two seconds. “No.”
Malfoy’s long eyelashes dipped and rose, and when they did, his irises were clear slate again, though Andy couldn’t pinpoint what had departed. Harry gathered his coat in the sure grip of one hand and clapped Andy on the shoulder. Not too hard, and just firmly enough to broadcast Harry’s sense of self-worth. It was hard work for a moment not to grasp after that hand.
“Pleasure meeting you. Have fun,” Andy said at last. Malfoy nodded to him, a knowing smirk touching his mouth. Harry wished him a good night, and they wove between the tables to the pub’s door and the chilly winter night beyond. Andy had the sense he was watching a departure that was much bigger than it seemed to be on the surface. He couldn’t have taken his eyes from them if he wanted to, and he didn’t want to stop looking at Harry Potter.
Harry said something that was covered over by the pub’s general merriment, a scant few words meant for his partner alone. A question, perhaps. Andy watched as Draco Malfoy’s head dipped, tilting toward Harry’s. The hardened smirk slipped loose, and grey eyes closed. Draco’s hand came up, and Andy saw pale fingers squeeze Harry’s shoulder. A lock of blond hair stirred under Harry’s exhalation.
As smoothly as breathing, Harry’s hand found Draco’s and grasped, held, let go.
Oh, Andy hadn’t a chance in all nine circles of hell. He could see that now. There was simply a shiver in the air between the two of them, a single tether suspended, pulling them together. One look at Draco Malfoy and his brain had known it was over.
It had just taken his heart a few minutes to catch up.
The door opened, letting both of them out into the blackness beyond, and then shut. There was a finality to it; Andy wouldn’t see Harry tomorrow, they were set to return home until the next trip into the field, and there would be no dinner or film or drink in between.
Four months.
He could guess where they were going. What they were retiring to do. He couldn’t blame either of them. Draco Malfoy was no one to turn down. Andy wouldn’t have, given half the chance. He could well imagine the perks of shagging that man, and they included bliss and breathlessness and an indefinable hard edge. Desperation in darkness. And Harry… well, Harry. Obviously.
He hadn’t really considered it until then, but… he wondered what they talked about afterward. How they talked. And which happened first, the talking or the… shagging?
There’d been talking in his fantasies of Harry. The expected utterances, of course. But not talking. For some reason, he was absolutely sure that Draco Malfoy spoke to Harry, in a soft voice that fit in the dark room amongst slowing breaths and twisted sheets and tangled limbs.
Alas. Andy gave himself the luxury of one final sigh. There were other men here tonight after all, weren’t there? He raised his glass, and his voice. “Oy. Drinks on me tonight, lads.”
* * *
The room was cosy. Draco cracked an eyelid without meaning to and sighed luxuriantly, stretching both arms up over his head. His hands bumped the wall; he bent his elbows and arched, feeling the serene strain in his ribs. He’d forgone even the sheets, but the air in the room settled over him like a soft blanket.
The scratching sound of the quill stopped. Harry’s head rose slightly, an amused smile hovering around his mouth. “Good morning, Beauty.”
“Wasn’t sleeping,” Draco muttered. Stretched again. Harry’s bare upper half glowed golden and fuzzy to his drowsy eyes, and his loose black pyjama pants accentuated his lean feet, cocked up on the stool in front of the chair. The window was dark behind him, pricked with stars. “And it’s not morning.”
“Hm,” Harry murmured. His quill feather dropped and rose as he resumed writing. Draco craned his neck a little and saw untidy stacks of parchment on the floor by Harry’s chair. Green eyes flicked up and fixed on him, and the glow in them was simply unmistakable.
“Well. Go ahead and look, then,” Draco said. Harry smirked.
“Oh, I have been.”
“Think I’ll sleep in a shirt from now on,” Draco groused, reaching up and pummeling his pillow with one lazy fist.
Harry chuckled at that. “You couldn’t sleep that way even if you wanted to. Boxers for you, and nothing else.” His quill scritch-scratched over the parchment.
Draco strained his arms and legs once more, but that marvelous, orgasmic stretch had already passed. He felt deliciously unhinged. “Still reporting, I see.”
“Nearly finished.” Harry raised a hand, brushing hair from eyes still trained on his notes. “Missed dinnertime.”
“Floo for room service.” Draco yawned, covering his mouth with the back of his hand. “I’ll be wanting chicken kiev. And salad with coriander.”
“Should be up in a few moments,” Harry said offhandedly. Draco caught his eye and didn’t feel inclined to keep the smile from his face.
“Sleep well?” Harry asked. His toes flexed, showing off the arch of his foot in the firelight. Draco gazed at it for a moment.
“Missed my bloody Apparition appointment,” he said at last, ignoring the question. “Otherwise I wouldn’t have been so late to the pub. That stupid fool from Glastonbury didn’t even show up in my office until an hour before, and then he just kept pushing his ‘miracle elixir’ on me. As if the Potions merchants in Istanbul hadn’t already developed the very same croup cure centuries ago.”
“Hob-knobbing with Abbey Potions-makers, were you?” Harry inquired amusedly.
Draco shrugged. “Well, it’s either that or tell you about the gorgeous, bronzed tat from Islington who I’ve secreted away for the days you’re out.”
Harry’s smile couldn’t be contained; it was the barely checked laughter that Draco was interested in, however. He folded his arms under his head and gazed at the ceiling.
“He’s a… polite man,” he said finally and Harry’s quill paused. Draco swung his head to look at the other man. “The one in the pub.”
Quill-tip returned to parchment again. “Andy, then. You know, I think you surprised him.”
“Stands to reason.”
Harry’s face was warmly lit by the fire, his hair black as ebony. Draco stared, drank his fill. Thought. “Still, he was friendly enough, I suppose.”
“Andy can’t not be friendly. He hasn’t got it in him.”
“Useful with a counter-curse?”
Harry’s eyes flicked over the page of parchment once before he set it aside and shook out another. The muscles in his arms flexed and stilled again, a mesmerising ripple. “One of the best. Though he doesn’t believe that.” Harry’s lips curved into a fond smile. “He’s been in the business for as long as I have.”
Draco considered long days spent outside of London, longer nights in unfamiliar inn beds. The same days and nights that had drawn the two of them taut until they snapped apart and floated off, Draco to his potions, Harry to his curses.
It had seemed so simple then. And now, the obviousness of it was still clear, in Draco’s sight at least.
It would be easier on you, Harry. But he didn’t say it.
The lock of hair fell down, obscuring Harry’s eyes again. Draco watched him, the way the moonlight from outside slipped over his bare shoulders. “He works with you, you know.”
Harry laughed, shaking the hair from his eyes with a single toss of his head. His grin was wide. “Does he, now? I hadn’t noticed.”
Draco heaved a sigh and rolled his eyes ceiling-ward. His fingers located one of his socks atop the rumpled duvet and he threw it at the other man’s head. “You really don’t have to be such an arse all the time, you know. Occasional bouts of it work well enough.”
The sound of the chair shifting, and then the pad of feet, came to Draco’s ears. The bed dipped and Harry’s voice sounded just near his left ear. “It worries you. Hence the attraction.”
“Just stating a fact.”
Harry inhaled. Exhaled. Fingers touched the line of Draco’s jaw fleetingly. “Tiring day?”
Draco shrugged. Opted for that smile. “Traveling takes it out of me.”
Harry smirked. “And I’m starting to think it’s not the traveling part that does it.”
“Ah, except I haven’t done anything yet today but travel, Potter.” Draco wiggled his eyebrows. “And who’s fault is that?”
“Don’t even start. You know I make it worth your while.”
Draco simply smiled at Harry. Couldn’t think of a thing to say, and knew, oddly, that it was a time for silence. Harry’s returned the smile, and there was an affection in it that pricked something deep in Draco’s heart and held there, stinging faintly. The fire popped, hissing suddenly, and in the ensuing quiet, he reached up and touched the dangling strands of Harry’s hair with fingers that felt loose and stretched, like the rest of his body. As if he couldn’t move.
“I love you.”
Harry’s eyes opened just a bit wider. Maybe the green deepened; Draco couldn’t be sure. He could smell the soft scent of fresh earth that lingered about the other man; no hint of Harry’s cologne. Harry did not wear it in the field, and the earthiness of his work pooled into him like some sort of waterfall. Draco licked his lips and shrugged. “If we have a reason for splitting up later, I don’t want it to be because I never told you how I felt.”
Harry’s nostrils flared slightly. Draco felt him shift his feet on the bed. “That was hard for you, wasn’t it?” Harry said thoughtfully.
Draco blinked. Blinked again and slumped back onto the bed. He ran both hands through his hair, shaking his head. “Damned right, Potter, now shag me already before I lose all sense of self-respect and start blubbering like a bloody Huffle—”
Harry’s lips claimed the words and Draco gave over far too readily. He could feel the tense and release of the muscles in Harry’s arms as he shifted on the rickety bed. Harry’s shoulders were half gold, half pearlescent, and his chest was nothing but a series of gentle curves and beautiful expanses of skin. Draco’s hand climbed up and pressed against Harry’s chest, fingers splaying, reaching further than any corporeal body could.
“Mm, better,” Harry murmured, finally pulling back. His dark hair dropped richly over his forehead. Draco fingered the prickly-soft place where that hair met Harry’s nape.
“So. Shagging me now?”
His lover’s head tilted and a small smile drifted there in his eyes. “No, I don’t think I will.”
Draco lifted an eyebrow slowly and glorified in the resultant warmth that suffused Harry’s irises. As if he couldn’t control it. “Going to make me do the hard work then.”
“No,” Harry said simply.
“Well, bloody hell.” Draco sighed and made to roll, to move. “And I came all this way.”
Harry followed him with a sinuous, whole-body ripple and caught his mouth again. Draco’s restlessness drained away. He kissed Harry back, and it was a sensuous, heartfelt plundering of his mouth. Harry’s tongue teased – a horrid and dastardly trick, that one – and Draco let it play along his, circling, stroking, just touching.
“You know how magnificent your mouth is?” Harry’s murmur was clear, and right against his lips. “It opens just enough at first, and then there’s just no way to resist. It’s the best mouth I’ve ever kissed.”
“That right?” Draco said smugly, and Harry nodded upward, more of a nudge with his nose, and their lips met again and fell back.
“Slick. Sounds dirty, but there you have it. And your tongue is simply heinous, I’d like you to know. Never met…” Harry kissed him, languishing around the tongue in question with thoroughly aching strokes. “…a more gifted tongue.”
“I see. You want to make out, do you?” Draco pulled one leg up, fitting it snugly against Harry’s waist, and relaxed his body down into the sheets.
Harry’s hands caught his wrists, a soft grip which Draco resisted until the inexorable push of Harry’s touch guided his hands up over his head. Harry lowered his whole body then, hands, arms, chest and legs and hips, in one somehow-perfect movement, pressing Draco’s wrists to the bed. Draco curled his fingers over Harry’s hands and tilted his head, and the next kiss was deeper and harsher than the others, but no less for wanting. And no less for patience. Harry plied his mouth until Draco was ready to give him his entire body in one single ephemeral thrust upward, and the man hadn’t even actually touched his body yet.
“I’d really like you to fuck me,” Draco said reasonably, and Harry raised himself up with a short laugh.
“We’ll get to that, you know. This is a little something I like to call foreplay.”
“Oh, do shut the fuck up, Harry.”
Harry did. He kissed Draco instead, and it was… nice. Exquisite and strenuous, and an agonizing turn-on. Harry’s forearms glistened with sweat before too long, and Draco felt so very tired from it all, bone-tired, but most unwilling to stop. Each slow kiss took strength, and he could feel Harry’s body shudder from time to time, muscles threatening to give out. What they might have been doing that was so taxing was impossible to define. Draco hadn’t had much experience with snogging as physically difficult, but with Harry it was the strain of perfection. Of trying to make it perfect. Of succeeding.
They hadn’t moved from that spot an hour later, not enough to count. The duvet was still a piled mass beside them, the pillow a satisfying presence beneath Draco’s head. But Draco was worn through and panting for air he didn’t have, arms locked around Harry’s body to hold him close, hands tangled hopelessly in his hair, legs twisted around their darker, steadier counterparts. His boxers were soaked with sweat between them, and his hair felt damp and tousled when Harry finally lifted away just enough to reach down and tuck his hands beneath Draco's thighs. Ease gently upward until his legs bent at the knee.
Draco had never been so ready in his life. His entire body felt utterly opened, nerves tingling all down his limbs. He touched Harry’s face, fingers desperate and quivering against his cheek. Harry gave him a weary smile, but the light in his eyes flared briefly.
It was barely movement, what they did. Eventually, his boxers went the way of his sock. Draco’s feet curled into the sheets and Harry’s body was a tight, hot press into his, tiny thrusts that were more felt than noticed visually. Harry buried his face in Draco’s throat and breathed harsh gasps into his shoulder, speeding suddenly into helpless panting, hips shuddering. Draco flailed with one hand until he could grip the edge of the mattress, and it was then that Harry’s voice came to him, hushed and ragged in such a way that he knew Harry had just come, but Draco had been unable to feel it through his own flawless, building euphoria.
“I love you, you know that,” Harry whispered.
Draco took his face in his hands and nodded, his vision prickling around the edges in infinite black specks that rode the coming tide. Leaned his head back as his body started to shake. Harry kissed his chin and Draco tightened his thighs around Harry’s hips, losing control over himself in steady increments that spiraled down and up and out.
“I know,” he gasped. “I know it.”
...
Part four: In Comparison
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Thanks for reading! ♥
Author: me
Pairing: H/D
Rating: R
Summary: Andy likes his life, his job... and his coworker, Harry Potter. Part three of the Arrangement series.
Disclaimer: The HP characters don't belong to me. Andy does.
Thanks to Coffee for the beta!
Also posted on AO3 and skyehawke.
...
The Arrangement
An Evening in August
Perfect Potter
He was a perfect male specimen, Harry Potter was. Andy didn’t have a problem with cataloguing each and every example of that perfection either. Just now, with his shirt sleeves rolled up to bare tanned, mud-streaked forearms, collar folded just haphazardly enough to bring attention to the fact that Harry wore ‘haphazard’ like a second skin, and dark hair ruffling into a continuous flow of obsidian silk, Harry Potter was more than enough reason for Andy to let his mind drift slowly out across the barrow downs and forget the map he held quite completely.
And that was saying nothing for the well-toned shoulders beneath that shirt, and the carelessly bronzed body. Andy knew it was there; he’d seen it, or at least the top half of it, on scorching days when the sun baked the clothing right off of any intelligent person’s frame. Andy dreamed of getting Harry naked three times a week, and shagging… He smirked to himself, finally looking down at the map, smoothing it with his fingers. Shagging or being shagged by Harry would put his dreams to shame, because Harry was the one thing that most other delectable types were not: he was caring.
“Andy, you certain that hole is over here?”
He looked up and found Harry standing, cutting a lean, steady shadow against the rolling hills of green behind. The sunlight dove through the speedily moving clouds, painting light all over his body like water.
“It’s right under your feet, Harry. Should be.” He didn’t need to consult the map.
Harry glanced at the towering blocks and henges of stone to Andy’s left, running a hand through his hair to clear his eyes. Solid pine green, those eyes.
Gods. It was time to stop acting the idiot before his chance ran away from him. Harry liked men, Andy knew that. Had made a point of knowing that. And there was something very blessed in that fact, a miracle that Andy had not failed once to give ritual thanks for.
He could see Harry counting the feet from the edge of the stone circle with his eyes. Ticking them off on slender fingers. Harry’s eyes flickered shut, then opened, and his lips parted, letting the faintest of whispers free. The grass at Andy’s feet pricked upright and then bowed out away from the stones in one muted sweep. Andy’s skin crawled at the touch of Harry’s magic. Something deep within the stone circle shifted, a grinding of the soul, and Harry looked down.
“Bloody hell,” he hissed and jerked his wand free. The curse’s first wave rolled out of the earth directly under Harry’s feet. Andy jumped, muttered counter spells to contain the spread of it, but Harry’s eyes flashed in the rippling sunlight; his wand shot out, and the magic gave a primal groan, the sound of cavernous earth, and unwillingly wisped away.
The hole looked frail and normal amidst the tall grass. Peaceful again.
Harry met Andy’s eyes and grinned, lopsidedly and the cause for Andy’s sudden lightheadedness. “Wasting Hex. Lousy one, too.” Harry raised his arm and beckoned to the small group of Wizard guides waiting on the outskirts of the stone circle. “Give us a few minutes to get out of here and then tell them they can send the Muggles back in,” he called.
Merlin, but Andy wanted that man. Had for ages. And Harry Potter was just the nice enough sort to give him what he wanted, if he didn’t insist on proving himself the complete and utter fool by not requesting it in the first place.
“You want to get a drink, Harry?” Andy said before he could find another reason to stop himself. A boyfriend, perhaps. There was no way someone who looked the way Harry did could be alone.
Harry flashed him that grin again. The wind dropped and his hair slid down rakishly over his forehead, parting just enough to bare the slight, unforgettable scar. “My pub, if you don’t mind.”
* * *
‘Harry’s pub’ was The Dragon’s Scales, a tiny, lopsided hole in the wall in Burford’s equally tiny Wizarding district. ‘Andy’s pub’ was located further afield in Tetbury, and usually was so crowded by this time of night that it was just as well Harry insisted and had his way.
Harry drank long from his pint of ale, and laughter spilled over from the nearest table, which was crowded with men and women and cloaks and empty mugs. Andy saluted them and Harry let out a pleased chuckle before leaning forward on his elbows. “You know, what I think? That hex was the Jamesons’. The thing had their smell all over it.”
“Maybe the Ministry won’t be such a load of arses this time and let them out for good behavior.” Andy leaned in a little as well, feeling a thorough and pleasant kinship with Harry, if he did say so himself. “Bill’s going to be livid.” And you’ve no idea how radiant you make me feel. It didn’t exactly fit in with the current topic, but it might, in a few beers’ time. Andy knew with a strange sense of levity that tonight would be the night he would speak. There was no reason not to. Harry seemed to be the last flawless, unattached man.
Really, it wasn’t as farfetched as one might think. Harry’s choice of employment took him out of his home in London staggeringly often, and though Andy wasn’t fool enough to believe that Harry had been without the occasional lover, a long-term relationship might very well be an impossibility.
Unless one could match such a strange and rigorous schedule. Thus, it was very likely that Andy was the best candidate. His job took him everywhere that Harry went.
Andy’s drinking partner lifted his glass in agreement of his last statement. “But it’ll give him something to do besides pounding the ancient roads of Egypt for the fifty-third time, yeah?”
He ought to speak now. Ought to ask Harry for another drink tomorrow back in London, maybe accompany it with a dinner. A film. A week. A month. Harry Potter had such an easy way about him, as if one could say anything and be certain of complete seriousness in response. He had a feeling that giving voice to his innermost yearnings for Harry’s ears would never result in ridicule.
A laughing, very inebriated couple stumbled their way through the door into the night, letting in a freezing bluster of wind before the heavy oak banged shut once more. When the bell tinkled merrily again almost immediately, Andy thought of missing scarves and misplaced coats left at tables, and looked up to witness the cheerful retrieval of said items. But it wasn’t the couple who walked into the pub.
A man in a thick coat the colour of Cotswolds clouds stepped inside, brushing something invisible from his shoulder with one expensively gloved hand. His blond hair gusted in the wind, so light as to look silver in the firelight. He was tallish, clothed in finer threads than the town of Burford witnessed on a regular basis, and next to the gaily chattering off-work group cluttered into the establishment, it was especially apparent. Andy had a brief moment of realising that he’d seen this man somewhere, and then a moment of deeper, more instinctual recognition from somewhere further back, but the context felt wrong.
The newcomer removed each glove with simple precision, and Andy felt his heart beat quickly against his ribs. Very handsome indeed. “I think that bloke’s eyes match his coat,” he said before thinking, because there was really nothing more arresting than the soft ash of the man’s irises. Andy would get to analyzing the rest in a moment.
Harry swiveled on his stool and took in the new arrival, and if there had been any doubt left about his sexuality, it died a quick, quiet death there in the haze of the crowded pub.
Andy had to physically draw his eyes away from his co-worker. He frowned curiously at the doorway instead. “He’s not a local.”
“No, he certainly isn’t.” Harry’s voice was quiet, and then it filled with a warmth Andy had been dreading since the moment he’d met the man: “Brightens a whole bloody room, doesn’t he?”
The way Harry’s eyes glowed… Andy sighed and looked down at his pint. Wasn’t possible. The blond man moved with the grace of a cat, cinder-grey coat pristinely sweeping against long legs in tailored black trousers as he sorted his way past the tables and drinking patrons toward the bar. His face was sharp and lithe, in that aching, ruthless way that hurt the most because things that were that ethereal weren’t meant to be grasped by mortal men. Couldn’t be more different from Harry’s earthy lines and comfortable charm. There was disdain in the way the man moved, but it was faint, as if it were always ready to swing to the surface, but not quite allowed its full freedom.
Halfway through the room, the blond man caught sight of them, and his step slowed, then quickened again.
“Just get in?” Harry asked once he was close enough, and there was a certain quality to his voice, as if it were meant only for the man he was currently addressing. As if it should have gone unnoticed by everyone else in the room.
The man gave a single nod, and Andy was struck again by that sense of familiarity. “Cheeks are red,” the newcomer said in reply. His voice was as calm as his gait. He lifted a hand and touched one finger to Harry’s flushed cheek.
“It’s windburn.” Harry turned on the stool again and graced Andy with one of those grins. “Andy—Andrew, rather. Andrew Somerset, Draco Malfoy.”
Oh yes, well, that explained it fairly succinctly. There wasn’t a wizard alive who didn’t know about Harry Potter, of course, but it felt much more elitist to know of the infamous surviving Malfoy. Andy surveyed his counterpart, and thought about extending a hand.
Draco Malfoy’s eyes slid over him, and Andy could see the sharp awareness in them. This one knew what he was thinking, or could guess very accurately. The tiniest of flashes quickened those mercurial irises. Malfoy nodded, letting his lips fall into a half-smirk.
“Pleasure,” the man said in a perfectly poised voice.
Andy nodded and smiled back as well as he could.
Harry’s delectable voice sounded again. “Have any trouble finding the place?”
Draco Malfoy sniffed dismissively. “Trust you to locate the most cramped, Muggle-like pub in all of Wizardom. Do you know, I think I actually missed this one back when I was in my formative, impressionable years.”
Harry snickered, and Andy looked at him, blinking. He’d never heard that particular laugh from his coworker before. It gave him a slightly lewd edge; if Andy had known it existed before tonight, he might not have waited so long. “And exactly which years were your impressionable ones anyway?”
Malfoy’s only answer was a secretive smirk. Secretive to Andy, anyway; he doubted Harry was excluded from the back-story. Indignation fluttered weakly inside him, and he just… had to know.
“Visiting him at work? That’s rather nice. You know, I think I’ve seen you before.”
Malfoy’s gaze settled briefly on him again. A nod.
“Didn’t know you were with Harry, though. How long have you two been…” Andy gestured, maintaining what he assumed was a pleasant smile. “Together?”
Harry’s eyes lifted to Malfoy’s face. His hand reached. Fingers closed around their slender, paler counterparts and squeezed. “Going on four months, now.”
Malfoy’s lips curved upward, and one brow lifted. “Potter can be a real romantic sot about it,” he countered easily. But Andy did not miss the brief grip of his hand around Harry’s.
So Harry was managing a steady relationship. Four months was a long time. And if he truly thought back, the timeline coincided particularly with a general brightening of Harry’s mood. Not that Harry Potter hadn’t always been genial. Andy figured there were two ways a man could go, having been through what Harry had, and Harry’d chosen the less stressful of them, definitely. His sense of humour and restful demeanor had always been a major selling point. It was just that he’d been… more at ease in the past four months than Andy could remember in years.
“Well, it took us a while,” Harry said, and there was a deep, painful fondness around his eyes. “There’s history here you wouldn’t believe.”
Andy had a feeling it wasn’t that sort of ‘on-and-off,’ the sort where one such as Andy Somerset might manage a year of glorious heaven in between the ‘on.’
He caught Malfoy’s extraordinary eyes again, fixed on him. There was no real malice there. Just an awareness, plain and open. If Malfoy couldn’t read his emotions, Andy was no curse-breaker. Malfoy certainly knew who he had here in Harry. He knew exactly who he had. All the trappings included.
Andy watched Harry’s fingers play with the hem of Malfoy’s sleeve, and drift over the back of his hand. Lingering at his thumb, pressing the knuckle with a fleeting stroke. Harry couldn’t seem to keep from touching the other man. It was a bitter, bitter draught to swallow, somehow. Andy felt the blush creeping over his face and focused on his pint, suddenly very aware of the blond’s shrewd gaze. He’d no idea if it was truly turned on him. But he didn’t feel candid enough to risk it at the moment.
The comforting lilt of Harry’s voice went on, shaping sounds that should have been words in Andy’s ears. He simply liked to listen to Harry speak, and wondered rather unexpectedly whether Malfoy fed the same addiction.
Maybe he was just slow, but his mind was still back in the reality where Harry Potter was single. Andy shook his head unobtrusively as Harry finished up a carefree relation of the hex they’d pulled out of the ground earlier that day.
“…long day. Amateur curse, but we were up too bloody early. Andy had to pry me with coffee.”
“You don’t drink coffee,” Malfoy said blandly. Harry’s face twisted, and it hit Andy that he was fighting a smile with every ounce of his being.
“All the more reason it worked. For a while, anyway.”
Andy did have to smile at that. It was true; Harry’s buzz had been short-lived at best. But the tremour in the blond’s eyes as he gazed at Andy’s coworker was more than enough to sober Andy up. A pale hand lifted, as if it would settle on Harry’s back. But Malfoy merely leaned forward and turned Harry’s empty pint glass, as if perusing it. Harry stretched one arm over his head, cocking his elbow lazily.
“What time is it, anyway? Half nine?”
Andy glanced over the bar. “Earlier.”
“Feels later,” Harry muttered, hiding a yawn.
“You’ll forgive me,” Malfoy said suddenly with a composed smile, “if I drag Harry away. Our schedules haven’t been so cooperative lately.”
“Touring tomorrow.” Harry stood with that same loopy grace. “Would you believe he’s never been to Stonehenge?”
Andy thought about it for all of two seconds. “No.”
Malfoy’s long eyelashes dipped and rose, and when they did, his irises were clear slate again, though Andy couldn’t pinpoint what had departed. Harry gathered his coat in the sure grip of one hand and clapped Andy on the shoulder. Not too hard, and just firmly enough to broadcast Harry’s sense of self-worth. It was hard work for a moment not to grasp after that hand.
“Pleasure meeting you. Have fun,” Andy said at last. Malfoy nodded to him, a knowing smirk touching his mouth. Harry wished him a good night, and they wove between the tables to the pub’s door and the chilly winter night beyond. Andy had the sense he was watching a departure that was much bigger than it seemed to be on the surface. He couldn’t have taken his eyes from them if he wanted to, and he didn’t want to stop looking at Harry Potter.
Harry said something that was covered over by the pub’s general merriment, a scant few words meant for his partner alone. A question, perhaps. Andy watched as Draco Malfoy’s head dipped, tilting toward Harry’s. The hardened smirk slipped loose, and grey eyes closed. Draco’s hand came up, and Andy saw pale fingers squeeze Harry’s shoulder. A lock of blond hair stirred under Harry’s exhalation.
As smoothly as breathing, Harry’s hand found Draco’s and grasped, held, let go.
Oh, Andy hadn’t a chance in all nine circles of hell. He could see that now. There was simply a shiver in the air between the two of them, a single tether suspended, pulling them together. One look at Draco Malfoy and his brain had known it was over.
It had just taken his heart a few minutes to catch up.
The door opened, letting both of them out into the blackness beyond, and then shut. There was a finality to it; Andy wouldn’t see Harry tomorrow, they were set to return home until the next trip into the field, and there would be no dinner or film or drink in between.
Four months.
He could guess where they were going. What they were retiring to do. He couldn’t blame either of them. Draco Malfoy was no one to turn down. Andy wouldn’t have, given half the chance. He could well imagine the perks of shagging that man, and they included bliss and breathlessness and an indefinable hard edge. Desperation in darkness. And Harry… well, Harry. Obviously.
He hadn’t really considered it until then, but… he wondered what they talked about afterward. How they talked. And which happened first, the talking or the… shagging?
There’d been talking in his fantasies of Harry. The expected utterances, of course. But not talking. For some reason, he was absolutely sure that Draco Malfoy spoke to Harry, in a soft voice that fit in the dark room amongst slowing breaths and twisted sheets and tangled limbs.
Alas. Andy gave himself the luxury of one final sigh. There were other men here tonight after all, weren’t there? He raised his glass, and his voice. “Oy. Drinks on me tonight, lads.”
* * *
The room was cosy. Draco cracked an eyelid without meaning to and sighed luxuriantly, stretching both arms up over his head. His hands bumped the wall; he bent his elbows and arched, feeling the serene strain in his ribs. He’d forgone even the sheets, but the air in the room settled over him like a soft blanket.
The scratching sound of the quill stopped. Harry’s head rose slightly, an amused smile hovering around his mouth. “Good morning, Beauty.”
“Wasn’t sleeping,” Draco muttered. Stretched again. Harry’s bare upper half glowed golden and fuzzy to his drowsy eyes, and his loose black pyjama pants accentuated his lean feet, cocked up on the stool in front of the chair. The window was dark behind him, pricked with stars. “And it’s not morning.”
“Hm,” Harry murmured. His quill feather dropped and rose as he resumed writing. Draco craned his neck a little and saw untidy stacks of parchment on the floor by Harry’s chair. Green eyes flicked up and fixed on him, and the glow in them was simply unmistakable.
“Well. Go ahead and look, then,” Draco said. Harry smirked.
“Oh, I have been.”
“Think I’ll sleep in a shirt from now on,” Draco groused, reaching up and pummeling his pillow with one lazy fist.
Harry chuckled at that. “You couldn’t sleep that way even if you wanted to. Boxers for you, and nothing else.” His quill scritch-scratched over the parchment.
Draco strained his arms and legs once more, but that marvelous, orgasmic stretch had already passed. He felt deliciously unhinged. “Still reporting, I see.”
“Nearly finished.” Harry raised a hand, brushing hair from eyes still trained on his notes. “Missed dinnertime.”
“Floo for room service.” Draco yawned, covering his mouth with the back of his hand. “I’ll be wanting chicken kiev. And salad with coriander.”
“Should be up in a few moments,” Harry said offhandedly. Draco caught his eye and didn’t feel inclined to keep the smile from his face.
“Sleep well?” Harry asked. His toes flexed, showing off the arch of his foot in the firelight. Draco gazed at it for a moment.
“Missed my bloody Apparition appointment,” he said at last, ignoring the question. “Otherwise I wouldn’t have been so late to the pub. That stupid fool from Glastonbury didn’t even show up in my office until an hour before, and then he just kept pushing his ‘miracle elixir’ on me. As if the Potions merchants in Istanbul hadn’t already developed the very same croup cure centuries ago.”
“Hob-knobbing with Abbey Potions-makers, were you?” Harry inquired amusedly.
Draco shrugged. “Well, it’s either that or tell you about the gorgeous, bronzed tat from Islington who I’ve secreted away for the days you’re out.”
Harry’s smile couldn’t be contained; it was the barely checked laughter that Draco was interested in, however. He folded his arms under his head and gazed at the ceiling.
“He’s a… polite man,” he said finally and Harry’s quill paused. Draco swung his head to look at the other man. “The one in the pub.”
Quill-tip returned to parchment again. “Andy, then. You know, I think you surprised him.”
“Stands to reason.”
Harry’s face was warmly lit by the fire, his hair black as ebony. Draco stared, drank his fill. Thought. “Still, he was friendly enough, I suppose.”
“Andy can’t not be friendly. He hasn’t got it in him.”
“Useful with a counter-curse?”
Harry’s eyes flicked over the page of parchment once before he set it aside and shook out another. The muscles in his arms flexed and stilled again, a mesmerising ripple. “One of the best. Though he doesn’t believe that.” Harry’s lips curved into a fond smile. “He’s been in the business for as long as I have.”
Draco considered long days spent outside of London, longer nights in unfamiliar inn beds. The same days and nights that had drawn the two of them taut until they snapped apart and floated off, Draco to his potions, Harry to his curses.
It had seemed so simple then. And now, the obviousness of it was still clear, in Draco’s sight at least.
It would be easier on you, Harry. But he didn’t say it.
The lock of hair fell down, obscuring Harry’s eyes again. Draco watched him, the way the moonlight from outside slipped over his bare shoulders. “He works with you, you know.”
Harry laughed, shaking the hair from his eyes with a single toss of his head. His grin was wide. “Does he, now? I hadn’t noticed.”
Draco heaved a sigh and rolled his eyes ceiling-ward. His fingers located one of his socks atop the rumpled duvet and he threw it at the other man’s head. “You really don’t have to be such an arse all the time, you know. Occasional bouts of it work well enough.”
The sound of the chair shifting, and then the pad of feet, came to Draco’s ears. The bed dipped and Harry’s voice sounded just near his left ear. “It worries you. Hence the attraction.”
“Just stating a fact.”
Harry inhaled. Exhaled. Fingers touched the line of Draco’s jaw fleetingly. “Tiring day?”
Draco shrugged. Opted for that smile. “Traveling takes it out of me.”
Harry smirked. “And I’m starting to think it’s not the traveling part that does it.”
“Ah, except I haven’t done anything yet today but travel, Potter.” Draco wiggled his eyebrows. “And who’s fault is that?”
“Don’t even start. You know I make it worth your while.”
Draco simply smiled at Harry. Couldn’t think of a thing to say, and knew, oddly, that it was a time for silence. Harry’s returned the smile, and there was an affection in it that pricked something deep in Draco’s heart and held there, stinging faintly. The fire popped, hissing suddenly, and in the ensuing quiet, he reached up and touched the dangling strands of Harry’s hair with fingers that felt loose and stretched, like the rest of his body. As if he couldn’t move.
“I love you.”
Harry’s eyes opened just a bit wider. Maybe the green deepened; Draco couldn’t be sure. He could smell the soft scent of fresh earth that lingered about the other man; no hint of Harry’s cologne. Harry did not wear it in the field, and the earthiness of his work pooled into him like some sort of waterfall. Draco licked his lips and shrugged. “If we have a reason for splitting up later, I don’t want it to be because I never told you how I felt.”
Harry’s nostrils flared slightly. Draco felt him shift his feet on the bed. “That was hard for you, wasn’t it?” Harry said thoughtfully.
Draco blinked. Blinked again and slumped back onto the bed. He ran both hands through his hair, shaking his head. “Damned right, Potter, now shag me already before I lose all sense of self-respect and start blubbering like a bloody Huffle—”
Harry’s lips claimed the words and Draco gave over far too readily. He could feel the tense and release of the muscles in Harry’s arms as he shifted on the rickety bed. Harry’s shoulders were half gold, half pearlescent, and his chest was nothing but a series of gentle curves and beautiful expanses of skin. Draco’s hand climbed up and pressed against Harry’s chest, fingers splaying, reaching further than any corporeal body could.
“Mm, better,” Harry murmured, finally pulling back. His dark hair dropped richly over his forehead. Draco fingered the prickly-soft place where that hair met Harry’s nape.
“So. Shagging me now?”
His lover’s head tilted and a small smile drifted there in his eyes. “No, I don’t think I will.”
Draco lifted an eyebrow slowly and glorified in the resultant warmth that suffused Harry’s irises. As if he couldn’t control it. “Going to make me do the hard work then.”
“No,” Harry said simply.
“Well, bloody hell.” Draco sighed and made to roll, to move. “And I came all this way.”
Harry followed him with a sinuous, whole-body ripple and caught his mouth again. Draco’s restlessness drained away. He kissed Harry back, and it was a sensuous, heartfelt plundering of his mouth. Harry’s tongue teased – a horrid and dastardly trick, that one – and Draco let it play along his, circling, stroking, just touching.
“You know how magnificent your mouth is?” Harry’s murmur was clear, and right against his lips. “It opens just enough at first, and then there’s just no way to resist. It’s the best mouth I’ve ever kissed.”
“That right?” Draco said smugly, and Harry nodded upward, more of a nudge with his nose, and their lips met again and fell back.
“Slick. Sounds dirty, but there you have it. And your tongue is simply heinous, I’d like you to know. Never met…” Harry kissed him, languishing around the tongue in question with thoroughly aching strokes. “…a more gifted tongue.”
“I see. You want to make out, do you?” Draco pulled one leg up, fitting it snugly against Harry’s waist, and relaxed his body down into the sheets.
Harry’s hands caught his wrists, a soft grip which Draco resisted until the inexorable push of Harry’s touch guided his hands up over his head. Harry lowered his whole body then, hands, arms, chest and legs and hips, in one somehow-perfect movement, pressing Draco’s wrists to the bed. Draco curled his fingers over Harry’s hands and tilted his head, and the next kiss was deeper and harsher than the others, but no less for wanting. And no less for patience. Harry plied his mouth until Draco was ready to give him his entire body in one single ephemeral thrust upward, and the man hadn’t even actually touched his body yet.
“I’d really like you to fuck me,” Draco said reasonably, and Harry raised himself up with a short laugh.
“We’ll get to that, you know. This is a little something I like to call foreplay.”
“Oh, do shut the fuck up, Harry.”
Harry did. He kissed Draco instead, and it was… nice. Exquisite and strenuous, and an agonizing turn-on. Harry’s forearms glistened with sweat before too long, and Draco felt so very tired from it all, bone-tired, but most unwilling to stop. Each slow kiss took strength, and he could feel Harry’s body shudder from time to time, muscles threatening to give out. What they might have been doing that was so taxing was impossible to define. Draco hadn’t had much experience with snogging as physically difficult, but with Harry it was the strain of perfection. Of trying to make it perfect. Of succeeding.
They hadn’t moved from that spot an hour later, not enough to count. The duvet was still a piled mass beside them, the pillow a satisfying presence beneath Draco’s head. But Draco was worn through and panting for air he didn’t have, arms locked around Harry’s body to hold him close, hands tangled hopelessly in his hair, legs twisted around their darker, steadier counterparts. His boxers were soaked with sweat between them, and his hair felt damp and tousled when Harry finally lifted away just enough to reach down and tuck his hands beneath Draco's thighs. Ease gently upward until his legs bent at the knee.
Draco had never been so ready in his life. His entire body felt utterly opened, nerves tingling all down his limbs. He touched Harry’s face, fingers desperate and quivering against his cheek. Harry gave him a weary smile, but the light in his eyes flared briefly.
It was barely movement, what they did. Eventually, his boxers went the way of his sock. Draco’s feet curled into the sheets and Harry’s body was a tight, hot press into his, tiny thrusts that were more felt than noticed visually. Harry buried his face in Draco’s throat and breathed harsh gasps into his shoulder, speeding suddenly into helpless panting, hips shuddering. Draco flailed with one hand until he could grip the edge of the mattress, and it was then that Harry’s voice came to him, hushed and ragged in such a way that he knew Harry had just come, but Draco had been unable to feel it through his own flawless, building euphoria.
“I love you, you know that,” Harry whispered.
Draco took his face in his hands and nodded, his vision prickling around the edges in infinite black specks that rode the coming tide. Leaned his head back as his body started to shake. Harry kissed his chin and Draco tightened his thighs around Harry’s hips, losing control over himself in steady increments that spiraled down and up and out.
“I know,” he gasped. “I know it.”
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Part four: In Comparison
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Thanks for reading! ♥
