Author's Note: A little one shot *loosely* inspired by the Netflix series Love is Blind. Thanks as always to my delightful beta, LightofEvolution. Hope you enjoy!

The drumming of jittering fingers over the surface of her assigned booth for the evening matched the pattering of Hermione's heartbeat. A surrounding velvet curtain was her only barrier to the rest of the lounge and bar area of the newly opened Saphire Inn on Diagon Alley. Not that the velvet curtain served much of a purpose — with an Obscuro charm blocking her vision, it wasn't like Hermione would have been able to see anything anyway.

Her fingers found the stem of the self-filling champagne flute that had been delivered to her table and she took a hefty sip. For at least the fourth time since sitting down, Hermione seriously considered walking out before this insane event even began. She still couldn't believe she had let Ginny sign her up. The entire concept was barmy. There was no way it would work!

The clinking of metal against glass echoed in the space, and what little chatter had been filling the room instantly quieted. Hermione returned her glass to the table and ran her palms against the smooth fabric of the crimson satin dress Ginny had spent all afternoon begging her to wear.

"Good evening," the voice of a wizard Hermione presumed to be the host announced. "In just a few minutes, we'll get started with our first round. But first, a few reminders of our rules."

Hermione listened intently, even if she had memorised the rules immediately upon her agreement to attend.

"Each initial conversation will last five minutes, after which you will rate each person on a scale from one to ten," the wizard began to explain. "You will then be partnered with your top three matches based on mutual interest for a second fifteen minute conversation. At that point, you will indicate who you would like to continue speaking with, and the rest of the event can be spent how you choose. But of course, three key rules will remain in place for the extent of the evening: no removing of the Obscuro charm, no unaltering of your voice, and no exchanging of names."

A jumble of pixies rattled inside Hermione's stomach. She wasn't keen on the idea of giving up so much control, even just for a few hours, but Ginny had made a valid argument on why this night was a good idea. Since her and Ron's break up nearly two years ago, her dating life had been a series of failed outings with wizards who only wanted to date her because she was the Hermione Granger — Harry Potter's brainiac friend, one-third of the lauded 'Golden Trio.' She was tired of people having preconceived notions about her. Was it too much to ask that someone just wanted to know her for her?

It was for that reason that Hermione was admittedly rather eager to meet wizards under the cloak of anonymity, yet that wasn't the part of the evening that perturbed her.

As if on cue, a jangle of a pair of keys appearing on the table shifted her attention downward — the real reason she suspected the newly opened inn had coordinated this event.

"We sincerely hope you find someone tonight that you find an emotional connection with," the host said, though Hermione doubted how "sincere" he truly was. "But once you do, the only way to reveal their identity is for one of you to invite the other person upstairs to one of our inn rooms, all decorated to the latest standards for fine wizard living."

Hermione withheld a scoff. This whole thing was just their way of filling rooms and spreading good word about their accommodations!

But the wizard wasn't done speaking. "Choose who you invite wisely — once inside the rooms, you'll be locked in there with the person until 8:00 am tomorrow morning. How you decide to spend the rest of the evening is, obviously, entirely up to you. However, if you don't invite someone, you risk never discovering the identity of the person you spent all night falling for."

And that was what was wrong with this evening! What was the point of all this if Hermione had no intentions of inviting someone upstairs? As if she was actually going to meet some wizard tonight that she felt so strongly connected to that she was going to voluntarily get locked inside a room with them until daybreak!

Yet despite her perfectly valid reservations, Hermione tried to remain positive. Just getting to speak to wizards without them knowing she was Hermione Granger would be a breath of much needed fresh air. And when she was satisfied for the evening, she could go home and sleep in her own cosy bed with no one else to share it with except for Crookshanks.

A ringing of a chime filled the room, and the event officially began. Hermione slipped the two room keys into her beaded bag and waited for her first potential suitor to take their seat on the bench across from her.

As it turned out, five minutes was not a very long time to chat with someone — but with many wizards, it was still too long. One wizard had spent the entire conversation presumably trying to impress Hermione by recounting all the different Quidditch moves he could successfully complete, while another had spent so much time trying to think of an answer to who his favourite author was that time was up before he said anything of value. Over ten conversations in and Hermione had yet to find someone she was even remotely interested in speaking to a second time. She was starting to get a sense that there was a good reason many of these men were still single…

The conversations droned on, and Hermione began counting down how many she had left before she could call it quits and dismiss this evening as another failed attempt at dating. She was down to her last three when a wizard plopped down across from her with a heavy groan.

"Don't sound so enthused to be here," Hermione said with only half-intended sarcasm.

The newly arrived wizard huffed. "You'll have to forgive my rude entrance," he said in what sounded like the resemblance of a drawl. "I just came from the worst conversation of my life."

"Sounds like my entire evening," Hermione said with a brief roll of her eyes. "What was so terrible about it?"

"She wouldn't stop talking about her bloody cats," he grumbled. "The whole five minutes!"

Hermione's cheeks heated, and she sprung to the other woman's defence. "There is nothing wrong with cats!"

"There is if you have twelve of them and have nothing to say about yourself!" he promptly argued back. "I get it; she has a lot of cats. But for Circe's sake, I don't need to hear which toys from the Magical Menagerie are each one of their favourites!"

An involuntary snicker pressed past Hermione's lips. "I suppose that is unnecessary," she accepted. "For what it's worth, my cat is entirely self-sufficient and more than capable of finding his own entertainment."

"It seems your cat and I have that in common," the wizard jokingly remarked. "And for the record, it's not that I'm not a cat person. You can blame it on the fact that I wasn't allowed to have one growing up. Father wouldn't think of it."

"Strict parents?"

He scoffed. "You have no idea."

They spent the rest of their time talking about their families, how they were both only children with parents who had high expectations for them, particularly when it came to academics. They even discovered that Charms and Arithmancy were both of their favourite subjects at Hogwarts. When the chime rang for them to rate the conversation and move on, Hermione found that it was the first time she was actually sad for a conversation to end.

"Will I get to speak to you again later?" she asked before he slipped through the velvet curtain.

She may not have been able to see him, but she could have sworn the wizard was grinning. "That'll be up to you to decide."

Hermione hardly paid attention to her final two conversations in the first round. She tried to, she honestly did, but her mind kept wandering back to that previous wizard. There was an underlying sense of humour to him that she hadn't expected while also having a decent number of things in common with her. Five minutes hadn't been enough time; there was still so much she wanted to learn about him. Now all she had to do was survive until the second round.

But as were the stipulations of the evening, she had three conversations to endure that round — with the wizard she wanted to speak to the most slated for last. The conversations with the first two men weren't terrible. They seemed educated and interested in getting to know her, but something felt missing. Hermione hated when she couldn't explain things, yet words just couldn't describe it. There was a connection she felt with that one wizard that she hadn't felt with any of the others.

When the third conversations of the second round finally came, Hermione found herself instinctively trying to smooth out her hair. She instantly felt silly. It didn't matter what her hair looked like; neither of them could see each other.

The sliding of fabric caught her attention and Hermione knew that the wizard was back.

"No groan this time?"

The wizard chuckled. "No groan, but that doesn't mean I'm not relieved to be back here with you."

It was a good thing his vision was obscured, or he would have been able to see the blush that now reddened her cheeks.

"So tell me more about your time at Hogwarts," she said, eager to see what other experiences they might have shared.

But instead of matching her excitement, the wizard seemed to tense. "Hogwarts was a... difficult time for me."

A pit formed in Hermione's stomach. She hadn't intended to bring up bad memories.

"We don't have to talk about it if you don't—"

"It's fine," the wizard assured her. "I've had a few years to reflect on it, and I understand now that most of my difficulties were either my own doing or were matters that were out of my hands."

"Like what?"

He sucked in a deep breath. "Let's just say I struggled to find the right crowd to hang out with," he stated, a hint of vulnerability in his tone. "And if I had it to do over again, I would have made some very different choices."

Hermione's heart stung for the wizard. While it hadn't lasted long, she knew how difficult it had been to navigate Hogwarts the first two months before she befriended Ron and Harry. She couldn't imagine going all seven years without feeling like you'd found the right friends.

She reached across the table and found his hand. It was broader than hers with a certain strength to it that she remembered from Ron. Did his job require something manual? Or did he, too, enjoy playing Quidditch?

The questions stayed locked inside for the time being. All she could concentrate on was the feel of his cool skin against hers as he accepted the small gesture and gave her hand a squeeze.

Their hands didn't move for the remainder of the conversation.

Even when the chime indicating the end of round two rang through the room, neither of them shifted from place. They didn't need to fill out a survey to know that this was the pairing they wanted to continue to pursue.

It was another one of those things that Hermione couldn't explain: she had just met the wizard, and yet something about him made her feel like she'd known him for years. The conversation seamlessly flowed to the point where Hermione couldn't keep track of when one topic ended and another began. They discussed books, magical theory, and she didn't even mind when he told her all about his favourite Quidditch team. He was honest and open and had a snarky sense of humour that made her roll her eyes despite the blindness. And the best part was, after two hours of conversation, not once did he bring up the war or ask what it was like to be friends with Harry Potter.

She couldn't remember at what point in the conversation it had happened, but she was now on the same side of the booth as him, fingers intertwined as her head rested on his shoulder.

"What's your biggest fear?" he asked, his soft voice brushing past her curls.

Hermione didn't have to pause. "Failure," she said, heart tightening at the admission. "I put a lot of pressure on myself because I grew up being told by some people that I would never be good enough, so I did everything in my power to prove them wrong."

"I… I can only imagine how much that hurt," he said, his words coming out partially choked. "I'd be lying if I said I didn't incite my share of torment as a child, but it's all things I deeply regret now."

She gave his hand a tight squeeze. Whatever he had done, she believed his remorse.

"My turn," she said, not letting the conversation linger on the topic. "What's the most important thing in your life?"

"Family," he answered. "I'd sacrifice everything for them."

Hermione peered up at where she imagined his face to be. "Me too."

A silence lingered between them, but not for lack of conversation. He felt it too, she was positive.

His fingers left hers, only to find the curve of Hermione's jaw. He brushed his thumb over her cheek and then over the delicate curve of her lips. Her breathing hitched. She still couldn't see him, but she could feel him leaning in, his hot breath ghosting closer. The hammering of her heart threatened to beat itself out of her chest, and her eyelids drifted closed.

He tilted her chin upward and met her lips with a simple, earnest kiss.

It had been too long since someone had kissed her — or a least, someone had kissed her that had made her feel like this. There was a desperate singing in her chest that urged for him to be closer, to have him pressed up against her, sinking into the kiss with every possible ounce of passion. But he was taking his time. The kiss was slow, deep, and his fingers pressed into her as though he was afraid that letting go might cause him to lose her. That was far from a concern, though. Hermione wasn't going anywhere.

His tongue traced along her lips and Hermione willfully parted them, welcoming the taste of her wizard. She slipped a hand against his face, and for the first time all night, she got to explore his features. His jawline was sharp, but his hair was silken smooth. The question started to creep into her mind: What did he look like? What colour was his hair? His eyes? How old was he? How tall?

Hermione didn't have the answer to any of these, and to her surprise, she didn't much care. She'd spent all night getting to know this wizard better than she knew some of her friends. She had to see him again. That much was certain. And there was only one way to ensure that happened...

She pulled away from the kiss. "Will you go up to one of the rooms with me?"

He stalled.

"Are you sure?" he asked, the first trace of hesitancy she'd heard in his voice all night. "This wasn't intended to pressure you. I just really wanted to kiss you."

Hermione blushed. "I really wanted to kiss you too," she said. "But I also really don't want this to just be for tonight."

Her pulse trembled in her fingertips as she reached for her bag and pulled out one of the keys. She placed it in his palm and curled his fingers around it.

"Meet me up there in five minutes?"

"I will."

Hermione placed one last kiss against his lips before slipping out through the velvet curtains. Once she had taken a few steps away from their booth, the Obscuro charm automatically lifted, and Hermione's eyes ached to adjust to the light after so many hours in darkness. A nervous tingling danced through her veins, stunned that her evening had turned out this way, but she had to know who her wizard was — at the very least, know his name.

If the five minutes during the first round felt long, the next five minutes felt like an hour. Anxiously waiting in the room, Hermione examined her reflection in the mirror. What if everything changed once he discovered who she was? Would he treat her just like all the other wizards? She suppressed the doubts. The wizard already liked her for her. That should be enough.

From the other side of the door, Hermione heard the twisting of a key. She stood in the entry, toes fidgeting inside the heels she had borrowed from Ginny. She wouldn't consider herself shallow, but she still hoped he was cute. For the first time since Ron, she truly felt a connection with someone. She just hoped he felt the same.

The door began to push open, and Hermione's nerves sent her whole body into a flutter. But nothing could have prepared her for who walked through the door.

Her heart stopped. There was no way. He must have the wrong room.

The same blend of shock and terror was painted on his face. A face she knew far too well. A face she had known for years. The face of Draco Malfoy.

Suddenly, the whole night felt like a farce.

"Tell me this is a joke," he said, the magic lifted so his voice had returned to an older version of the one she'd heard taunt her countless times.

She masked the hole that now penetrated her heart and eyed him with heavy disdain. "I'm waiting for the same."

He reached for the doorknob, but it was too late. They were already locked inside.

"Great," he groaned before turning back to Hermione with a frown. "I should have suspected it was you from the moment you brought up your cat! How could I have forgotten your obsession with it?"

Boiling heat rushed to Hermione's cheeks. "Oh, please. At least I was honest with you!" she snapped, mind still struggling to process if this was really happening. "You said Charms and Arithmancy were your favourite subjects!"

"Oh, so that's a lie now?"

She huffed. "Everyone knew Potions was your favourite."

"Everyone assumed Potions was my favourite!"

Malfoy appeared adamant, but what was or wasn't his favourite class wasn't what stung Hermione the most.

"You fooled me," she said, her words coming out as more of a choke than she had hoped. "Here I was, thinking I had finally met a wizard I actually liked, when really, you had spent the entire night skirting around the truth to avoid revealing who you are." She released a bitter scoff. "'Struggled to find the right crowd to hang out with?' To think you actually made me feel sorry for you!"

His jaw tightened. "The whole purpose of this evening was for people to not judge me based on who I used to associate with," he sneered, fiery annoyance rising to the surface. "Or did you conveniently already forget what else I confessed to you tonight?"

The urge to immediately snarl something back prickled at the tip of her tongue, but she swallowed her venom before anything spat out. The question remained suspended between them as Hermione reflected on one of the final parts of their conversation, the words now taking on new meaning.

She blinked at him. "It was me you were referring to earlier, wasn't it?" she asked, a flicker of hope reigniting in her chest. "When you said you'd incited your share of torment?"

Malfoy was blankly staring at the nearby wall decor, but she knew what his lack of response meant.

"Did you mean it when you said you regretted it?"

She took a step towards him, and Malfoy met her gaze.

"I meant every single word I said to you tonight."

Without giving it a second thought, Hermione pushed up on her toes and settled her lips over his, sealing them together in a firm, ardent kiss. Stunned surprise seemed to freeze Malfoy for a splinter of a moment until the warmth of her lips registered in his brain. His hand cradled in the small of her back to tug her closer.

Hermione's heart was seizing, still battling with the fact that the wizard she'd been so captivated by all evening was Draco Malfoy, but when her lips parted and his tongue darted out to brush against hers, she lost herself in his entrancing embrace. A soft sort of whimper hummed against his lips as the gentle press of his fingertips dug into her waist. Flaming desire to touch him burned her skin, and Hermione reached for the fabric of his button-down shirt, deepening their kiss even further.

A low moan rumbled in his throat, and before long, Malfoy had her back flush against the wall, his hands now buried in the curls of her hair. Hermione's breathing grew shallower as he began to trail his kisses from her lips up the edge of her jaw.

The pounding of his heartbeat pressed against the errant beating of her own while his breath danced over the shell of her ear. "Do you still want me?"

Her eyes met the pewter grey pair peering into her, and she nodded. Despite everything, she couldn't resist how much she so very much still wanted him.

A single finger grazed down her neck, and Malfoy's lips found the sensitive spot on the column of her throat as his finger slid the thin strap of her dress off her shoulder. His tongue flicked against her skin and Hermione released a short gasp.

She ached for more as her fingers began to fumble with the knot of his tie, now desperate to explore what laid underneath, but the distracting sensation of his hands running down the curve of her body was making it hard to focus. She had just managed to yank the tie free when his fingers found the hem of her dress and teased the formerly covered skin.

His lips left her neck. "When you want me to stop—"

"Please," she rasped, all logic falling to the wayside. "Don't stop."

Malfoy didn't need to be told twice. With a flick of his wand, the lights in the room immediately vanished, leaving the moonlight as their only guide. Hermione propped herself on the corner of the bed as Malfoy rushed to remove his cufflinks and set aside his suit jacket. A coil heated in her core just looking at him. Draco Malfoy was an attractive man — one she was about to see a lot more of.

Guiding her farther back on the bed, Malfoy stared down at her reclined form. He smirked. "If only those other wizards knew what they missed out on tonight."

Hermione rolled her eyes, but whatever retort she was going to make was lost when his lips crashed onto hers. Through his shirt, she could feel the hard planes of his chest pressing against her and she began battling to free the shirt's buttons. Piece by piece, their articles of clothing were removed, disregarded and scattered across the floor. When all that was left were her knickers and his shorts, Hermione couldn't help the flush of her cheeks.

Propping himself up on his forearm, Malfoy used his other hand to take hold of the soft flesh of her breast. Her heart seized, and Hermione had to bite her lip to prevent her resulting moan from resonating too loud. The pad of his thumb rolled over the nipple and a gripping sensation started to bud inside her. His palms pressed and massaged the breast, earning more and more whimpered breaths until his lips sealed around one nipple and she couldn't hold back any longer.

Hermione's mind was going blank. With eyelids fluttered closed, she lavished his every feel, his every touch. In those moments, it didn't seem relevant who he was. She was back inside the darkness, only caring about how this wizard made her feel.

Needing more, Hermione reached for his shorts and slipped her hand under the waistband. She took his hard length into her hands and gave it several long, slow pumps.

"Fuck," he gasped, air hissing through his teeth at her touch. His lips refound hers, more desperate and urgent than ever.

Hermione maintained the rhythm of her strokes as Malfoy groaned into their kiss. Never leaving her lips, he single-handedly pulled his shorts down the rest of the way, kicking them off with their other discarded items. Hermione hardly had time to register the fact that he was now completely naked before two fingers dipped under the fabric of her knickers and glided over her wet slit. He slid one, then another into her heat, and Hermione's back arched off the bed.

Short, ragged breaths filled the room as Hermione's heart rate escalated wildly. Mounting pressure continued to build inside her core, and when his fingers teased her most sensitive spot, her nails gripped into his bare back as she released a strangled gasp.

Taking hold of his length, Malfoy stroked himself a few more times, and Hermione watched with heavy-lidded anticipation as his tip poised her entrance. With a slow, steady push, Malfoy sheathed himself inside, eliciting a moan out both their mouths. Hot, fervent kisses pressed against her lips, her jaw, her neck as Malfoy found his pace. Hermione's arms were wrapped around his shoulders while his hands dug into her hips, feeling her essence clench around him as he repeatedly drove into her.

One hand lifted to lose itself in her curls as he buried himself even deeper, reaching a spot inside her that turned her vision hazy. Again and again, his length pressed against the spot, pushing Hermione ever closer to the edge. Blurry stars speckled her vision, and Hermione dug her hands into his hair to pull him ever closer. Only a few thrusts later, the wave of consuming climax rippled through her body, electrifying every nerve. Malfoy captured her moan with a searing kiss and soon followed with his own sweet release.

Breathing heavy, they both fell flat against the mattress, neither saying a word as they came down from the impassioned rush. She lay silent, mind stuck processing what had just happened. The frantic racing of her heart had yet to calm as she stared up at the ceiling.

There was no cuddling or gentle kisses, just facts. She had slept with Draco Malfoy.

She tried to think of something to say, but it seemed her words to him had finally run out for the evening. Within minutes, they were both asleep.

...

Her mind was in a clouded daze by the time sunlight broke through the curtains and stretched across the bed — a bed she was still sharing. Turning to face the wizard, Hermione's heart was undecided. A strand of white blond hair had fallen over his eyes, and a momentary impulse tempted her to brush it away, but she didn't. Away from the heat of the night before, logic had returned, and with it, reality. In the veil of anonymity and the blanket of night, it didn't matter who he was. But could that sentiment withstand the harsh judgment of morning light?

Pulling back the covers, Hermione gathered her scattered articles of clothing and padded into the loo. She turned on the shower and waited for the water to warm before stepping in. The cascade of droplets rained over her skin, washing away the physical evidence of the night before, but her memories weren't so easy. Her thoughts kept cycling back to their conversations together and how natural their connection felt before his identity muddled her perception. Then the rest of last night happened, and she was even more confused.

She'd be lying if she said she didn't find him attractive; that wasn't the issue. The only problem was the fact that he was Draco Malfoy.

It was all well and good to build an emotional connection with someone before introducing the physical, but nothing about the process of that evening had accounted for complicated histories. Was their budding connection enough to overpower years of animosity? And what about what everyone else would say?

She twisted off the showerhead and the water pellets came to a dripping stop. Ten minutes in the shower and she had no more clarity on how to feel.

Once she had dried herself off, Hermione slipped back into her dress from the night before. It felt so much more unlike her in the daylight, but it was better than going out there in a towel.

Returning to the main part of the room, Hermione discovered that Malfoy was already awake, sitting on the corner of the bed as he inserted his cufflinks into his sleeves.

He acknowledged her with a curt nod. "Granger."

"Malfoy."

Silence suffocated the room, Hermione's mind still at war with the logical thing to say or do, when she noticed the time. 8:12 am.

Malfoy followed her gaze. He'd seen it, too.

Cufflinks in place, he clapped his hands on his thighs and pushed himself upward. "Well, I suppose I'm free to go now."

Hermione stood frozen, the battle to form proper words heavy on her tongue as Malfoy brushed past her and headed straight for the door. Her mind may not have been made up, but his apparently was. He was leaving.

She held her breath and waited for the now inevitable sound of the door closing as he left this whole experience behind, but it never came.

When she faced him, Malfoy was still at the door, hand on the knob, not yet turned.

"Assume for a second I wasn't Draco Malfoy. That I was just some wizard you met last night," he said, eyes cast downward on his grip around the doorknob. "Would you be letting me walk away right now?"

Hermione sucked in a breath. "If I was any other witch, would you be leaving without asking when you'd see me next?"

The questions hung between them, neither person voicing a response, but they both knew the answers.

After several moments, Malfoy tucked his hands into his trouser pockets and stepped away from the door.

"I came into this event because I wanted to meet someone who could potentially love me for the man I am now, not the boy I was," he said, head held high as he moved back towards Hermione. "I'm no fool. I know there are things in my past that some witches and wizards can never forgive. Ask me a day ago and I'd put your name on the top of that list." He stopped right in front of her, pewter gaze uneasy as he peered into her eyes. "But just my bloody luck, the witch I fell for last night was you."

There was a swell inside Hermione's chest, but her heart and her brain were two separate entities. She plopped down on the bed and sighed.

"You already know how I felt about you last night," she said, no point in hiding the obvious truth. "But can you honestly tell me that you think we'd stand a chance dating outside of those velvet curtains?"

"There's a definite chance it won't," he admitted. "But since when did the possibility of failure stop Hermione Granger?"

He reached his hand out and Hermione accepted it. Helping her up, Malfoy smiled at her.

"So what do you say? Dinner, Friday night?"

It only took a moment's consideration before she offered him a grin of her own. "I suppose I could make that work."

As they exited through the lobby, their fingers remained laced with one another, the fog now lifted from Hermione's brain. There was a time and place for logic, but this time, she was listening to her heart.

End Note: Thanks for reading! Reviews are much appreciated :)

Also, my WIP Somewhere Down the Line is now updating weekly and is entering its final chapters if you want to check that out as well!