Thank you again for all the reviews!

This is the last part of Company Manners. Thank you to everyone who read along and enjoyed it.

Emma Lansby was gaping at them.

That was not the main reason that Harry had suggested dancing with Draco during the Zabinis' latest party—any more than having them dance together was the reason that Astoria Zabini had decided to have a party in the first place—but it was an enjoyable side-effect.

Harry kept one eye on her as he steered Draco through the steps of a waltz he knew so well that there was no chance he would step on Draco's foot during it. Lansby's mouth had tightened into the arrogant sneer that so many blood purists wore so well by then. Harry wondered idly how he had put up with it, even for the sake of his job.

There were some things the Ministry had no right to ask him to do. Violating his basic principles was one of them.

"I'm over here," Draco hissed into his ear. "Anyone would think that you were dating Lansby, by the way you keep turning your head."

"Someone," Harry said, swinging Draco skillfully out to the limits of his arms and then pulling him back in again without looking away from Lansby, "sounds petty and jealous."

"If I see that person during my fit of distinguished pique, I'll be sure to tell him."

Harry turned back towards Draco, smiling at him as he brushed Draco's fringe out of his face. Draco's eyes were narrow, and he looked on the verge of stamping his foot with frustration. "As if I could look away from you for long," Harry breathed into his ear. "See how often I do it for the rest of the night."

Draco raised a doubtful eyebrow as he stepped towards Harry and then whirled away from him into the next step of the dance. "I'm sure that I'll lose count of how many times you do it before the end of the party."

But Harry was faithful to his promise. He hovered next to Draco as he sat down at their table, asking what he wanted to eat and drink and fetching it for him. He told Draco jokes that made him laugh just enough, in a dignified manner, so that no one looking over at them would see his red cheeks. He danced with him twice more; Astoria had provided enough music that those who liked both the most formal dances and those who could appreciate a slight relaxation of traditions could whirl around the floor at some point. He murmured soft endearments that Draco often ignored when he was chatting to someone else, but the rest of the time he listened with constant blinks, as if he thought that Harry must mean someone else with those extravagant words.

Finally he coughed and ducked his head. "You don't have to look at me that much," he murmured. "I believe that you care more about me than Lansby."

Harry took up Draco's hand and bowed his head low over it, letting his breath rather than his lips stir the small hairs on Draco's s fingers and warm his skin. Draco stared at him with parted lips. "Is it embarrassing you?" Harry whispered. "Do you want me to stop? If the answer to either of those questions is yes, then I can stop."

"You're only doing it because I mentioned Lansby and you wanted to prove a point," Draco whispered back. From somewhere, probably the suspicion he'd just mentioned, he managed to add harshness to his tone. "That's the part that I find embarrassing."

Harry dropped his smile and let his eyes stare straight into Draco's. "Lansby is an excuse," he said. "I've been wanting to do this for a few weeks now, to show you how you're appreciated and coveted and cherished and admired, but I thought you might think it was too soon."

Draco briefly closed his eyes. Harry could sense the struggle he was having with himself. He was used to shielding his emotions in public and manipulating them for the best effect on someone else, but that was in part because few things in public would arouse any depth of emotional response in him. Harry was appealing to him on a level that would ordinarily be private only.

Harry gazed at him and waited in silence for his answer. He would have stopped long since, except that he had seen the shining contentment come and go in flashes in Draco's expression. Draco partially wanted this and partially did not. The final decision must lie with him, and Harry didn't think he had the right to hurry it.

Finally, Draco opened his eyes and said, "I think you've done enough for one evening. If you want to share something like this with me after we've gone home, then we'll do that. For now, the embarrassment is too much."

"I'm sorry," Harry said, and squeezed Draco's hand once, before dropping it to take his own chair. "I did want to ask you about that Quidditch game you dragged me to yesterday. What madeyou think the Cannons had a chance of winning?"

"You didn't tell me that they'd gone that much downhill in the past five years!" Draco protested, his face brightening at once. "I'd heard the Falcons had an injured Seeker and a missing Chaser. Playing against a full Quidditch team should have been more difficult for them than that. A few Galleons on the Cannons seemed like a safe bet."

Harry gave him a pitying look. "Draco, it's the Cannons. That's all you need to know."

They spent the rest of the evening talking about things like Quidditch, winged horses—apparently Zabini had a pair of them that Draco was quite enthusiastic about—and how much paperwork Harry had to fill out in the Ministry. No mentions of Paul, or the war, or Harry's friends or Draco's, or the blood purists, or even Harry's job beyond the minor griping about the Ministry. Harry had worried at first about how they would talk normally together. They would have to; not every conversation could be an intense series of emotional epiphanies. But they shared so many bad memories that his brain had seemed empty of subjects when he racked it.

Not so. Draco could talk for hours on end about himself, and he instinctively avoided mentions of Paul, instead talking about the foods he liked, the time he had fallen from his broom as a child and broken his arm, why he still approved of house-elves despite the moral arguments Harry had absorbed from Hermione, what had happened the last time he'd got drunk in Blaise's company, and numerous other things that Harry hadn't known and couldn't have imagined much interest in before this year.

Harry propped his chin on his hand at one point and listened, happily, to Draco talking. His voice babbled like a running stream. He had actually slopped a bit of wine over the side of his glass as he waved it about in telling his stories and hadn't noticed. Harry had dried it for him. Draco would be embarrassed if he saw it later.

This was the kind of thing he had once feared would be impossible with a pure-blood lover, whose every word would be a guarded game. But Draco was perfectly willing to talk openly because Harry had placed privacy wards around their table before he started.

Even if Draco had wanted to save some of the conversation for their homes, the wards would have been worth casting for the sake of the frustrated glances that Lansby kept darting them. Harry caught her eye once and stared boldly. She would now assume that their enthusiastic conversation was a plot against her.

She promptly conjured a mirror so that she could look over her shoulder. Harry drowned his chuckle in wine and in enjoyment of Draco.

*

Draco told himself it was ridiculous to feel as if he were walking into a room with Paul in it. This was only a small pub, a place most of his acquaintances were unlikely to know existed, and the people in it were either strangers who would be indifferent to him or Harry's friends.

It's the last category that's the problem, he acknowledged to himself wryly, and then stepped through the front door, his head high, his cloak swinging from one arm. If he had to enter this place, then he would do his best to mix pride with casualness.

Harry looked up from a table near the back of the room and smiled warmly at him. The people sitting with him—Weasley, Thomas, and a man Draco remembered after a doubtful moment's survey as being called Finnigan—turned and peered at the door. More than one mouth fell open. Thomas grinned and extended his hand, and Finnigan grunted and dug out some Sickles. Apparently whether Draco would actually show up had been a matter of some debate.

They shouldn't have doubted me, Draco thought as he made his way past other tables where people seemed mostly to be pissed already, at seven in the evening, or arguing about Quidditch. Why would they think that I would only accept Harry in the places where pure-bloods associate, and not go to the places where he feels most comfortable?

He ignored the fact that he needed to focus on the warmth of Harry's smile to keep walking. That was a minor detail, and not for sharing.

"So, Malfoy," Weasley began as he sat down in the chair next to Harry and Harry slid a mug of Firewhisky towards him. "Harry tells me that you bet on the Chudley Cannons to win in their last game."

Draco stiffened slightly, but then glanced sideways with one narrowed eye and saw that Harry was completely relaxed. Harry gave him a subtle smile. Draco knew what that smile meant. I told him about this for a good reason. Trust me.

"That's right," Draco said, managing to drain his voice of most of the automatic hostility that it acquired whenever he encountered a Weasley. "I had heard that the Falmouth Falcons had sustained enough misfortunes they shouldn't have been able to win. I listened to the wrong people." He sighed and took a small sip of Firewhisky. The spell he'd cast on his mouth before he came in here would strip it of its alcoholic content and fill his mouth with water instead. Draco had no intention of getting drunk in this kind of company, or of tasting a drink that he hated. "Of course, I should have listened to my common sense."

"I respect someone who lets faith override his common sense sometimes," Weasley said, so vehemently that Draco jumped. His nervousness wasn't helped by Weasley reaching out and clapping him clumsily on the shoulder. "Because without faith, what is anything worth?" His face was red, which Draco had thought was a bad sign, but then he swayed gently back and forth in his seat, and Draco understood that he wasn't seeing anger. "We have to have faith. We have to believe in things larger than ourselves."

"That doesn't always include a bloody Quidditch team that loses every game it plays," Finnigan muttered into his mug.

Not softly enough, as it turned out. Weasley leaned forwards and jabbed a finger at him that nearly took Finnigan in the eye. Finnigan cursed and ducked his head. "I respect the Cannons," Weasley announced to the rest of the pub. No one turned to look at them as far as Draco could tell, so the other clients must have been used to this sort of behavior. "They keep playing even though they have no chance! Bravery in the face of inevitable defeat! That's courage."

From there, the conversation evolved into a long and rambling argument that seemed to be mostly about how many times a Quidditch team had to lose before someone could be declared stupid for supporting them, and Draco was forgotten. He leaned back in his chair and looked at Harry.

"You told him I supported the Cannons so he would give me a bit of that respect he was talking about," he murmured.

Harry met his gaze, his own eyes reflecting gentle amusement. "Yes. I was trying to make it easier for you to feel at home here and for him to accept you."

Draco sipped more of his fake Firewhisky and watched as Harry talked to his friends, laughing at what they said more frequently than he would laugh at anything in the company of pure-bloods, exchanging amused glances with Finnigan and Thomas over Weasley's behavior, and making frequent attempts to draw Draco into the conversation. Draco repeated some of the things he had said a week ago to Harry about Quidditch at Blaise's party. He feared they would bore Harry, but he received them with a soft delighted smile and the other people at the table treated his words as new and astonishing.

It was far easier to get along with them than Draco had feared it would be. As the evening wore on, he began to relax and stop thinking they would attack him.

That meant he had more time to watch Harry.

Frankly, he was astonished that Harry had had so much trouble accepting that he had taken the pure-blood codes and made them a part of himself. Even here, in the presence of people he had every reason to trust, he was reserved, watching faces before he committed himself to expressing his thoughts, subtly manipulating his friends with mention of what he thought would make them accept Draco, restricting himself to smiles instead of open laughter. And Draco wasn't oblivious to the fact that no more Firewhisky had passed Harry's lips than his own. The only thing he ever drank deeply of was butterbeer.

That helped to relax Draco, as well. Harry wasn't really two different people, one when he was with pure-bloods and one when he was with everyone else, though he might have reason to think he was. That meant Draco was less likely to suddenly find a stranger in his arms.

Or my bed.

Harry had showered attention on him over the past month since they'd officially announced to their friends that they were dating, but hadn't tried to push Draco further than kisses and one handjob. He hadn't even suggested that Draco should stay the night in his house. He seemed to assume—

Draco blinked. Oh, of course. I thought it was strange that he was being so shy, but he's probably assuming I'm the one who's shy and reluctant to get involved with a lover after Paul. He's holding back to give me as much space as possible.

It was considerate of him. Kind. But Draco had had enough of kindness and consideration, and needed something else to assuage the ache that burned in his gut and groin.

He waited until Weasley was roaring drunk and in the middle of a complicated argument with Finnigan over who had said what at a Quidditch game six months ago, and Thomas was involved in watching them. Then he slid his hand onto Harry's thigh beneath the table and gave him a discreet squeeze.

Harry turned his head towards him at once, though slowly enough not to draw the attention of any of his mates. Draco felt smugness run through him like warm water. With him as my lover, I have the best of both worlds—politeness and courtesy and beauty and elegance, with someone who didn't grow up in that world and understands the harsher aspects of it.

He couldn't feel anything but pity for the pure-bloods who had known Potter for five years and yet hadn't managed to snap him up. He let some of that show in his face, mingling with the desire and impatience he felt.

Harry shivered. Then he reached out and covered Draco's hand on his thigh with his own, clamping down. Draco could read answering desire in his clenching fingers, and caution. Not here.

Draco rolled his eyes and squeezed back. I wasn't suggesting here, you idiot. Only letting you know I was interested.

Harry inclined his head, a small smile playing around the corners of his mouth, and turned back to the debate between his friends. His hand stayed in place, and the next time he reached out for his drink, he managed to brush his arm gently across Draco's shoulder.

Draco closed his eyes and leaned his head back, letting his hair sweep down Harry's neck. Harry visibly caught his breath—visibly to Draco, at least. He highly doubted anyone else at the table could see it even if they weren't drunk.

Finally. At last.

Some doubts he hadn't admitted harboring melted away. There was a line between respecting what Draco had gone through and holding him at a distance because he didn't find him that attractive after all, and he had feared that Harry was on the wrong side of it. He should have known that, if anything was going to be the problem for Harry, it would be excess compassion. All the pure-blood training in the world couldn't rid him of that.

I'm glad.

*

Harry leaned against the door of his house with his heart roaring in his ears like a thunderstorm. He fumbled the key, and it fell to the ground. He Summoned it wandlessly, not even realizing the jump of his magic until he'd done it, and this time he managed to put it in the right place. He was more successful at removing the protective wards that needed to be gone before they could enter the door.

Draco's arm slipped around his waist, and he whispered into Harry's ear, "How much discussion do you usually like before you do something like this?"

"I don't know," Harry said, startled into honesty. "I haven't done enough of it to be sure."

Draco froze, to the point where Harry would have thought he had vanished if he couldn't feel his breathing. Then he hissed, "Please tell me that you haven't reached this age and still stayed a virgin."

Harry burst out laughing, which pushed the awkward moment aside as effectively as anything could have. He turned around, grabbed Draco's wrists, and pinned them gently to the wall next to the door. Draco looked up at him with hazy eyes and started trying to work a thigh between his legs.

"I'm not a virgin," Harry murmured. "The problem is that I haven't felt able to be honest with my lovers in quite a long time. Either I was so famous they agreed to what I wanted without thought, or they were prickly enough that I went along with what they wanted because I was terrified of frightening them away."

Draco blinked, some sense surfacing in the haze of his eyes. "I have a hard time imagining you as terrified of anything."

"I'm terrified of hurting other people." Harry turned and caught one of Draco's fingers in his mouth, using his tongue to lap carefully around it. Then he sucked teasingly, until Draco was bucking and making small moans. Harry let his finger go long enough to say, "And I didn't feel I could talk as openly with them as I can with you. Not all of them trusted me with the secrets of their pasts and what they absolutely couldn't endure because it would hurt them, for example."

Draco took a deep breath and lifted his shaking hands until they settled on Harry's shoulders. "I can understand why," he said. "It takes a lot of courage to bare yourself like that, and in front of someone who seems as strong as you do."

"Seems," Harry said softly. "You were witness to the fact that I was lying to myself about something I should have recognized as the truth."

Draco lifted his head and licked Harry's chin. Harry tried to keep his breath from escaping in a groan, but his chin radiated scintillating lines of warmth away to the rest of his body, and he made the noise anyway. Draco smiled smugly and hooked his fingers around Harry's ear to hold him in place.

"But you lie very well," Draco murmured. "This is one place where I don't want that deception, but you should know how much I value that you can do it."

Harry felt as though someone had Healed a wound he'd been carrying around for years. He didn't talk to his friends about his job much because he was afraid of their disapproval. Did they despise him for lying to and manipulating people and saying things he didn't believe simply to get close to someone Kingsley wanted him to spy on? If they did, he didn't want to know about it.

But Draco valued his skills. That was wonderful. Harry lowered his head and kissed Draco for a few minutes, until both their bodies were thrusting against each other and they would be lucky if they didn't have orgasms right here on the stoop.

Harry wrapped a hand around Draco's shoulders, closed his eyes, and rested his forehead against Draco's for a few minutes until he got some breath back. "We were discussing what you'd like in bed, and what I'd like," he muttered. "Or at least we were. Until we started discussing why we don't often discuss that."

Draco's laughter rattled up from his chest and made Harry's hands on his shoulders vibrate. "This is new for me, too," he said. "I believe that was the point of the discussion we got into." He used one finger to trace Harry's cheekbone. "To be perfectly honest, Paul and I—" He swallowed.

Harry curved his hand around the back of Draco's head and kept it there, offering comfort and support in silence. He would have offered to interrupt, but the sharp little motions of Draco's chin at the moment suggested that this was something he needed to talk about.

"He only wanted to do what he liked in bed, and he didn't want to change it often." Draco's bitterness seeped through his voice, but he took a shuddering breath, and a moment later, he sounded more contemptuously amused. "A creature of habit, he called himself."

"A boring creature," Harry said.

Draco chuckled against his throat, making Harry shudder and stretch his neck up, aspiring to more. "Yes. I'm glad I left him when I did, or I might have died of boredom, never mind outrage." He cleared his throat. "At any rate, he usually wanted me to bottom on all fours, and take care of myself as far as coming was concerned. It was some special treat when he let something else happen." The bitterness was back in his voice again. "So, this time, I'd prefer to top, and in a way that lets me see your face."

Harry smiled and brushed the back of his hand up Draco's cheek, mainly to watch his eyelashes flutter. "And if I were to say that I also prefer topping, and I think the perfect solution is for us to both shag each other tonight?"

Draco had stilled at the first words, but now he looked up at Harry with a mixture of wonder and disbelief. "And you think we could really do that? What if one of us comes while the other's fucking him?"

"Then perhaps we can take that as a testimony to our lovemaking techniques and our knowledge of each other," Harry said smugly, "and sleep a few hours until we're ready to go again."

Draco's cheeks flamed a more brilliant red than they had so far. Harry raised an eyebrow, and Draco shook his head slightly. "There is no other lover I would even consider having this conversation with," he muttered. "It would all have ended in hurt feelings and interruptions long before now. I would have thought something was wrong when you said that you preferred to top, that you were ignoring my request."

"Then, as I said," Harry whispered back, "we should take this as testimony of our knowledge of each other." He adopted a perplexed expression. "And shouldn't you be claiming that it's proof of your superiority to all those other misunderstanding people, and proof of your superior taste that you chose me?"

Draco laughed again and pressed forwards, away from the wall, to crowd Harry with kisses until he almost fell off the stoop. "Absolutely," he said. "I'm glad that we cleared that up."

Harry was smiling as he leaned against the door to force it open.

*

Harry naked was a sight that Draco could drink up, both because he was beautiful and because of the contrast with Paul.

Paul had always leered and made dirty jokes when he was naked, as if it was something to be ashamed of. It got to the point where Draco was almost glad to turn over and look away from him, because at least that way he wouldn't have to see the prurient gleam in his eyes as he looked at Draco.

I should have left him long before I did. But the thought of people telling me "I told you so" was so painful…

Draco gave a mental shrug. He had already scolded himself for that, and he didn't want to spend much more time thinking about it. It was as boring as all sex with Paul had become in the end.

Harry, by contrast, strode about the bedroom taking off his clothes with energy like a living flame. He kept running his eyes up and down Draco's body, concentrating on different parts of him—now his feet, now the clean length of his arms, now his hair, now his nipples, now his face. Draco spread his legs lazily, reveling in the way Harry's eyes widened and his breath caught in a sharp hitch that puffed his chest out.

He thinks I'm beautiful. He loves me, maybe. He cares for me, certainly.

He thinks I'm beautiful.

Even though Draco wasn't chatting wittily at the moment. Even though he wasn't showing bravery in facing up to Harry's friends, or frequenting places they did. Even though he was doing nothing but lying here, practically putting himself on display.

He could be beautiful just lying there.

Draco happily contemplated this new idea until Harry approached the bed with a pot of lubricant in his hand and a face that shone with joy. He climbed onto the bed—Draco had been glad to see that the sheets were not an objectionable color—and bent over Draco, letting his hair sweep down his body, as he asked, "How do you want to do this?"

"I said I'd like to top first," Draco murmured. "That's still true."

Harry managed to smile then, a smile that was brilliant and deep, but which washed off his face again in the next moment. He was simply feeling too much for a smile, Draco decided, and that sent another surge of power and pleasure through him. I'm causing this. I'm causing him to lose control of his muscles, I'm so beautiful.

Merlin, I am good.

Harry lay back on the pillows, spreading his legs and urging his hips towards Draco. Draco hadn't sat up fully or managed to reach the lubricant before Harry cocked his head around and said, "What's taking you so long?"

"Admiring your breathtaking impertinence," Draco snapped, and dipped his fingers into the lubricant. He was probably harsher than strictly necessary in applying them to Harry's arse, but Harry was grumbling and whining by then about how he might get better results if he tied Draco to the bed and sat on his cock, and Draco was feeling a bit irritated.

Harry gasped when Draco stuck his fingers in, but then asked, "And what's taking you so long now?"

Draco stretched him open in offended silence and slid his cock in without asking if Harry was sure he was ready, which he'd intended to do. Harry gasped, then grinned at him and arched his hips up again, causing Draco to slide deeper with a small yelp.

"You—you're an idiot," Draco said, when he had his breath back. It was an effort to speak that much. He wanted to toss his head back and pound and thrust and forget everything else. Squeezing, oh God, and the fact that Harry was smiling up at him with perfect complacency made everything better.

"Not at all," Harry said, lifting his legs to Draco's shoulders and then throwing himself backwards so that he leaned more comfortably on the pillows. "I wanted it rough, and I wanted it fast, and I got what I wanted, didn't I?"

He manipulated me. The bastard. That deserved a punishing thrust, so Draco gave one, and then no others, because he was too overwhelmed by what was happening to his body, the pleasure circulating through him like blood, to care any longer about the minor irritations that Harry had put him through. He braced his knees and fucked fast and hard, in celebration and liberation. Paul had denied him this. His own pride had denied him this. His childish attempts at revenge on Harry could so easily have denied him this.

He had succeeded, against all the odds. And Harry was smiling up at him, or gasping, or distending his mouth in a wide gape that made him look like a fish and which Draco was going to taunt him about sometime when he had both breath and clear thoughts back and wasn't in danger of throwing his back out in sheer joy.

Harry linked his hands together behind his head, ostentatiously not touching his cock, and, his eyes on Draco and a devil's smile on his face, squeezed down with his arse. Draco tried to yell, but it emerged as the wrong kind of yell when he came with a shudder that struck all the way down to his toes.

Harry caught him as he fell on his chest and kissed him, first on the lips, then on the cheek, then on the neck. Draco, dazed and panting, was too limp to return the kisses properly for long moments, but then he rolled off to the side and hit Harry's shoulder, hard.

"I assume that's my reward for giving you a good time?" Harry rubbed the forming bruise, but not even that had destroyed his idiotic grin.

"You made me come before I was ready," Draco said. "I was really enjoying that, and I wanted it to last longer."

Harry hesitated for a moment, and Draco saw his eyes squint as if he were holding back fear. Then he snorted and punched Draco in return. "I don't think you could have lasted longer, Draco. Your hands were shaking where they held me, and you were wearing this expression on your face like a constipated badger."

"My hands were not shaking," Draco said, because he refused to dignify the badger comment with a response.

"Yes, they were." Harry looked down contemplatively at his own hips. "I'll have wavery finger-shaped bruises in the morning."

"You won't." Draco knew he sounded sulky.

"Yes, I will." Harry leaned forwards and kissed him before Draco could respond. "It was tremendous," he whispered to Draco, "and I enjoyed it. We're going to have so many more chances to repeat this that very soon you won't remember this first time as disappointing."

Draco made a small contented noise, and flopped back on the pillow beside Harry. He shut his eyes, because the room was spinning. And his hands were shaking, though he tried to hide them behind Harry's shoulders so that Harry wouldn't notice. That had obviously taken him more effort out of him than he thought, and maybe he wouldn't have lasted all that long even if Harry hadn't been such a bastard.

Though he was not about to admit that.

Harry stroked his hair and his face with motions that felt absent, but then Draco opened his eyes and realized how intently Harry was watching him. He shivered a little, and lifted his face for another kiss, remembering that Harry had also wanted to fuck him. He opened his legs and rubbed his hip suggestively against Harry's cock.

Harry gasped and shut his eyes. "You're right," he whispered when he could. "Teasing is absolutely not fair."

"I'm not teasing," Draco said. "Unless you've changed your mind and you want my mouth instead of my arse." He eyed Harry's cock speculatively. It was so red by this time that he thought Harry might come before Draco could get into position to swallow, but a quick squeeze should take care of that.

"I thought you would be too tired for a second go," Harry said, blinking as though Draco had given him an unexpected gift.

"Well, I'm not," Draco said, and reached out to pinch Harry's nipples, because he thought Harry would probably come if he touched his cock right now, and Draco wouldn't embarrass him like that for the world. "Are you ready?"

*

Entering Draco was like nothing he had experienced before.

That was because it was Draco, not because there was something so amazing about a warm arse that it stole all Harry's words. But the way that Draco spread his legs open and lay still beneath him, gazing up with a trust and a reserve in his eyes that spoke of the world in which he'd been raised and which Harry shared, made Harry's hands tremble as he slicked his cock with lubricant.

Draco's gaze dropped to Harry's hands, and his eyelids drooped with satisfaction. "I see that you're also going to leave fingerprints in the shape of shaking hands," he murmured.

"Shut up." That came out a lot more harshly than Harry had intended, and he shook his head and cleared his throat before he tried to speak again. "How much preparation do you need?"

"Start preparing me, and I'll tell you when to stop," Draco answered.

Harry honestly lost track of time then, and of the number of fingers that he'd slid into Draco. He couldn't look away from Draco's face, the steady, unwavering stare and the way his lips parted as he whispered, "Another, now." He never varied the wording. He never seemed to blink. Harry wasn't entirely sure that Draco hadn't hypnotized him.

"That's enough," Draco said at last, and Harry's hand slid free of his arse as if the word had been a physical push. He licked his lips absently as he reached out and lifted Draco's hips higher so that he could reach it more easily with his cock. They were dry, and so was his throat. At the moment, Draco's face was all the water he needed.

"Higher. And in."

Draco's voice did shake on the last word, which Harry was prepared to take as a sort of triumph—probably the only one he would get. He let his head fall back against the pillows as Harry pushed into him, and then he began to pant. The panting had Harry shoving forwards before he meant to, his hips surging and his eyes shutting in pure ecstasy.

"Harder. Faster."

Harry didn't mind the terse commands. Each time, the words reached into his body and urged it in new directions he hadn't known it was capable of. It occurred to him, distantly, that Draco was in control of this lovemaking much as he'd been in control while Draco was inside him, but he didn't worry much about it. If anything, it simply pointed out that he and Draco were a match in more than one way.

"Open your eyes."

Once again, Harry obeyed before he knew what he was doing. He found himself staring into a pair of fathomless grey eyes, clearer and colder than he had thought they would be, considering Draco's red face and mussed hair. Then Draco, still holding his gaze, did the same thing Harry had done and clenched down hard with his muscles.

Harry didn't have time to draw his breath in before he came. His orgasm was a scalding flood of pleasure, and the sight of Draco's eyes followed him down into the midst of that pleasure, hovering in front of him, unreadable, shining, perhaps judgmental.

When Draco smiled at him and reached out his arms to embrace him, Harry felt he had found his true release. He collapsed forwards and laid his cheek against Draco's neck, murmuring, "Maybe next time you won't be so lazy."

Draco froze. "What is that supposed to mean?" he asked at last, in a brittle tone.

"You stole my technique," Harry said. "I want to see what you can do when you aren't plagiarizing."

He fully admitted he deserved it when Draco rolled over and hit him.

*

"Are you ready?"

Draco turned, careful not to move the lines of his robes much, and met Harry's eyes. "I should be the one asking you that."

"But you're the one who looks as if he needs it asked," Harry countered, and moved forwards to stroke the small of Draco's back, safely out of sight for anyone who might look at them from the dining room. "Do you want to do this? I've met your parents socially before. I know how to give them a polite excuse if you need to leave."

Draco straightened his shoulders. He wanted to leave. Every dinner he'd had with his parents since he came back to England had been tense and uncomfortable, which was one reason he'd been staying with Blaise and Astoria. His father took every opportunity to remind him that he'd said from the beginning Paul wasn't good enough for Draco and that Draco would have been well-served to listen to him. His mother sat by with burning eyes and made occasional cutting remarks. Draco thought he'd made more progress in forgiving himself than they had in forgiving him.

But he couldn't keep running away forever. Harry had proven that. Draco had taken a risk regarding him—a double risk, considering that he'd tried to court Harry with a broken heart and when Harry seemed uninterested—and it had paid off. What remained now was for him to try that again.

And to remember that the consequences of his risks could not be so evil, not when he had Harry at his side.

"I want to do this," he said, reaching out and laying his hand on Harry's arm. "If we leave, it'll be harder next time I want to face them. They'll have more time to think of insults."

Harry leaned forwards and kissed his temple. "I love you, you know."

Draco's breath seemed to freeze in his lungs. He started to turn, because that was the first time either of them had said it, and while he knew Harry must mean it, he still needed to see Harry's eyes.

But the dining room door opened at that moment and his father leaned out, one hand clenched around the top of his cane as if he truly needed it for balance. "Draco," he said, ignoring Harry entirely. "Come in."

Draco hid a sigh. They needed to perform for the public again, and there was no way that he could give Harry an obvious message, not with his parents watching.

But he closed his hand down on Harry's arm and squeezed—a hard, frantic, possessive squeeze, like the squeeze of his arse muscles around Harry's cock, like his hands on Harry's shoulders when they kissed in front of his friends.

Harry smiled at him, a deep and dazzling smile, and Draco knew he had been understood.

His father's frown darkened, but Draco knew that Lucius had just as obviously not understood the signal that passed between them.

They walked into the dining room together, heads held high, strides perfectly matched, glancing neither to left nor right. But if anyone had been looking closely enough, they would have seen the cloth of Harry's robe rucking under Draco's fingers as he stroked his arm.

No one else saw. No one else knew. They were in public, and intensely private.

As he smiled at his mother and settled into the game both he and Harry had been born to play, Draco reveled in the contradiction.

End.