Chapter 11: The Morning After
They woke tangled together, the morning light filtering through the curtains. The air was thick with their mingled scents, and the tension from the night before had settled into a raw, aching need.
Hermione stirred first, awareness seeping in through layers of warm, deep sleep. Harry’s arm was a solid weight across her waist, his face buried in the curve of her neck, his breathing slow and even against her skin. The possessive warmth of him was everywhere. She could feel the hard line of his body pressed against her back, and a low, answering heat pulsed through her.
She shifted slightly, turning in his arms.
He awoke instantly. Auror reflexes. But the sharp alertness in his green eyes softened the moment they found her. He didn’t move, just watched her, his gaze tracing the sleep-softened lines of her face. His hand, splayed on her back, flexed gently.
No words. They were buried under the weight of something more fundamental.
Harry rolled onto his side, facing her fully. His hand slid from her back, down over the curve of her hip, then up under the hem of her old t-shirt. His palm was calloused and warm against her stomach. She inhaled, sharp and quiet. His eyes asked a silent, desperate question.
She nodded, biting her lip.
His hand continued its journey downward, fingers slipping beneath the elastic waistband of her shorts. He paused again, his thumb stroking a slow arc over her hip bone. Her breath hitched. His gaze never wavered from hers as he finally cupped her, finding her slick and ready for him.
A soft, shuddering sigh escaped her. Her eyes fluttered closed for a second before forcing themselves open, wanting to see him, wanting him to see her.
He began to stroke her, slowly, deliberately. His touch was not tentative. It was sure, learning her rhythm with an intensity that was almost clinical if not for the fierce tenderness in his expression. He watched every flicker of reaction on her face—the part of her lips, the dilation of her pupils, the faint flush spreading across her cheeks.
“Harry,” she breathed, her own hand coming up to clutch at his shoulder.
He leaned in, kissing her, swallowing her gasp. His tongue moved against hers in a lazy mimicry of the motion of his fingers. The dual sensation was overwhelming. She arched into his touch, a broken sound catching in her throat. The coil of pleasure tightened, low and deep, with a startling swiftness. It had been so long, and this was Harry—his scent, his touch, his focused, awed attention.
The climax rolled through her, wave after wave, stealing the air from her lungs. She tore her mouth from his, gasping his name into the quiet room, her fingers gripping his shoulders as if she might fall. He held her through it, his movements gentling, prolonging the sensation until she was boneless and shaking against him.
He withdrew his hand, bringing it up to rest between them on the pillow. He didn’t break the gaze. The silence stretched, filled only with their ragged breathing.
Slowly, he brought his fingers to his own lips, never looking away, and tasted her. Her stomach clenched. A primal, victorious light flashed in his eyes, gone as quickly as it came, replaced by a vulnerability that made her chest ache.
“Okay?” he finally rasped.
She could only nod, her voice utterly lost. She reached for him, her hand trembling as she placed it against his cheek. He turned into her touch, pressing a kiss to her palm.
Sunlight pooled on the rumpled sheets between them. The ordinary sounds of London morning traffic filtered faintly through the window. The world hadn’t ended. It had, in fact, narrowed to this sunlit patch of bed, to the salt-and-skin scent on his breath, to the profound quiet settling in her bones.
“That was…” she began, her voice hoarse.
“Yeah,” he finished for her, a faint, dazed smile touching his mouth. “It really was.”
He shifted, wrapping his arm around her and pulling her close so her head rested on his chest. She listened to the frantic hammer of his heart gradually slow. His other hand came up to idly play with her curls.
“I don’t know what the rules are,” he said after a long while, his voice a low rumble under her ear. “For this. For us.”
“There aren’t any,” she murmured. “We’re making them up.”
“Scarier than facing a Hungarian Horntail.”
“Infinitely.”
He laughed, a soft, genuine sound that vibrated through her. “Git.”
She smiled against his skin. The ease of it, the familiar insult nestled in this terrifying new intimacy, was an anchor. She propped herself up on one elbow to look at him. “What happens now? Right now, I mean. This morning.”
“Well,” he said, his fingers trailing down her spine, making her shiver. “I’m starving. I think I remember you having eggs. And toast. We could attempt not to burn your kitchen down.”
“A lofty goal.”
“And then,” he said, the lightness fading from his tone, “we have to leave this room. This flat. We have to decide what we’re walking into.”
The Ministry. Her unmasked scent. His presence at her side. The bond, still incomplete but humming between them like a plucked string.
“You’ll be there,” she said. It wasn’t a question.
“Try and stop me.” He sat up, the sheet pooling around his waist. He ran a hand through his hopeless hair and squinted at the clock on her bedside table. “It’s already half-nine. We’ve wasted the morning.”
“I wouldn’t call it wasted.”
He looked down at her, sprawled across the pillows, her curls a wild halo, her expression soft and sated. The look in his eyes turned fierce, possessive, tender all at once. “Neither would I.”
He swung his legs out of bed and stood, stretching. The morning light caught the scars on his back, the definition of muscle earned through relentless training. He found his t-shirt from the floor and pulled it on.
Hermione watched him, a strange sense of domestic surreality washing over her. Harry Potter, in her bedroom, making her bed-head worse by running his fingers through it, talking about eggs. It was mundane. It was revolutionary.
“Come on, Granger,” he said, offering her his hand. “Up. Facing the world starts with breakfast.”
She took his hand, letting him pull her up. She didn’t let go immediately, their fingers lacing together. She looked at their joined hands, then up at him. The bond between them didn’t roar. It purred, a contented, waiting thing.
“Okay,” she said. “But you’re cooking. I have a very important report on the aerodynamics of Snidget feathers to mentally prepare for.”
He grinned, that brilliant, easy grin she’d seen defeat darkness. “Won’t know what hit them.”