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Macaron Mission
Chaperoning the house baking challenge had its benefits.
One such benefit was the ability to sample the treats first thing in the morning, when they were still fresh and untainted by unknown hands and unpredictable children. Hermione had assembled for herself a small collection of treats in a small cake box she carried around in her bag as she moved past the tables to make sure that none of the classes cheated or sabotaged their peers' baked goods.
It had been her idea to start this event when she joined on as the Muggle Studies professor several years prior. It would be a great way to foster interhouse healthy competition and a way to understand the experience of what muggle youth did as a class activity. At first, she was met with resistance from the board, but eventually, they agreed to the event. Minerva had already given her blessing far before then, so all she had to do was organize it.
She was sure that the board had agreed only because she offered that it would be a great time for the board to show the donors some appreciation and to give parents a chance to see their children in the middle of the year.
Minerva had been excited for the event because it gave her one more thing to compete with her peers over. The betting pool around house points had gotten a little dull, and Quidditch matches were drawn along clear house affiliation lines. In the baking challenge, the only line was who was the best baker.
Filius, Pomona, and Minerva were dead set on proving that their specific recipe was the superior recipe, regardless of what they’d chosen to make that year. Each professor then spent each year improving on the previous, trying to indisputably win over their colleagues. A small panel of judges, often the head of the board, the minister, and some lucky handful of understudies who got the day off from tedium to taste cakes, would go through each house and the staff table and declare which one was the best.
Last year had been a devastating defeat for Filius, who swore that Minerva had paid off the judge in some way. He went so far as to assume that the older witch had beguiled one of the younger men from the Ministry who had ruled in her favor. They still weren’t fully on speaking terms over it, nearly a year later. Hopefully this year would not result in another year-long pudding feud.
Hermione checked each student table once more, nibbling on a petit four that she’d claimed from the 3rd-year Hufflepuff table, before making her way to the front of the room to check on the staff table. They had decided, after the first year where Pomona ‘accidentally’ smashed Filius’s seven-layer cake to the ground, that the staff table would remain anonymous, the food not labeled in any way to indicate who had made it. This was mostly to keep the professors honest and less likely to sabotage due to the risk of damaging the baked goods of a friend versus that of a confectionary foe.
Glancing over the table, Hermione didn’t need a label for most of what was on offer. She had developed a pretty keen understanding of who was going to bring the fruitcake (Rolanda), the sinfully dark chocolate cake (Neville), and who would bring rock cakes with little smiles baked on with raisins (Hagrid). Nestled alongside those was her prized Victoria Sponge cake, with the carefully dusted sugar on top, that she’d made the night before. Hermione was just about to step away when she noticed something out of the ordinary. There was a new item on the table, and Hermione hadn’t seen who had put it there, and it wasn't there when she last checked the spread.
Delicate, brightly colored macarons sat in orderly little rows in a long white paper box. They alternated colors, from robin’s egg blue, bubblegum pink, lemon yellow, and sage green. Perplexed, she wondered who had taken the time to make them. She knew from her own ill-fated attempt that they were not something that you could just throw together. Unbeknownst to the mystery baker, whomever had made them had made her favorite treat of all time. Hermione had tried exactly once to make macarons, and it had been a disaster that she never wished to repeat again. Instead, she often had to sate her craving for them by popping off to a shop during a weekend night and doing her best to not consume the whole lot before the next day was over and make them last the week. Hermione did not have many weaknesses, as far as she considered it, but macarons were one of them.
Carefully, Hermione selected one of each color, careful to not crush them as she tucked three into her box. The last one, a sage green one, she brought to her lips. She prayed it was pistachio, her favorite flavor, before sinking her teeth into it.
The moan that escaped her was involuntary as the crisp exterior gave way and the moist interior melted in her mouth, flooding her senses with pistachio as the cream filling hit her tongue. Euphoria flooded her as she shut her eyes, savoring the bite as she leaned on the table with her other hand.
Swallowing it down, she exhaled in elation at the incredible, almost orgasmic experience she’d just had. The macaron was perfect, exactly how they were supposed to be, and it left her a little weak in the knees. Hermione would never have said a single cookie was better than sex before this moment, but after that, she would have vowed that it was. It took everything in her to not immediately hoard the entire box of them for herself and refuse to let anyone taste them at all. As a compromise with herself, she took one more of each color, greedily tucking them away as she marched away from the table.
She had a mission now; she needed to know who had made them and what she would have to do to convince them to make her more.
Her first culprit was Minerva, who had promised she would bring something different this year to wow the judges. She’d thought the lavender lemon cakes were hers, but now, she wasn’t so certain. She raced up to the older witch, who was minding the Gryffindor tables while the students set up their treats.
“Do you know who made the macarons?" Hermione asked.
Minerva adjusted her glasses, looking confused before her eyes moved to scan the tables she was monitoring. “Macarons?”
Hermione pointed back toward where she’d come from and the long white box. “The ones on the staff table?”
“No,” the older witch shook her head, following her gesture with her eyes. “I didn’t see who put them there. Why is something wrong with them?”
There was nothing wrong with them; they were perfect. That was the point. She frowned, knowing it was not her perhaps favorite co-worker who had made them. “No, I just need to know who made them.”
“Ask Aurora, maybe she tried something new this year,” Minerva offered before turning around and giving a stern look at two young men who had decided to duel with cake pops. “Gentleman, now is not the time.”
With a new avenue to investigate, Hermione dashed over to the Astronomy Professor, who was sitting with a cup of tea just outside the Ravenclaw tables, reading the Daily Prophet. She glanced up at Hermione with a smile, letting her tea cup hover at her side with a flick of her wand.
“The baking challenge is looking promising this year; you’ve outdone yourself,” the other witch praised.
“Thank you,” Hermione accepted, before launching into her inquiry. “Did you make the macarons?"
“I made the toffee cake,” Aurora answered, her eyes widening with pleased surprise. “There are macarons?”
A wash of territorial jealousy ran through Hermione because she didn’t actually want anyone else to have the cookies on the table. Dismissing it with an inhale, she gestured to the staff table at the front of the room. “On the staff table, do you know who made them?”
“No, but I am going to try one for myself,” Professor Aurora hummed, standing and putting her paper down in her seat. “Although, you could ask Horace; he might know.”
That was a brilliant idea; Horace was the one who tried to wiggle what everyone was making out in the days before. Either he made them, or he knew who did. Hermione scanned the event, looking for the Potions Professor as she popped another decadent macaron into her mouth.
Prepared for the sensation, she still let out a soft groan as the raspberry cream and meringue melted between her lips. Merlin, she had to find out who had created these; they were better than the ones she had when she was actually in France. Opening her eyes, she found Horace, standing by the last of the Slytherin tables, flourishing his wand to help balance a cake on a cake stand.
Hermione jogged across the room to him, sweeping her tongue against the back of her teeth to relish the lingering taste of the delicacy she’d just had.
“Horace,” she called out breathlessly.
He turned abruptly at his name being called and then gave her a boisterous grin. “Oh, my dear Hermione, what a lovely day for such an event.”
“Did you make the macarons?” she panted, hoping that her desperation was not as evident as it felt.
Horace glanced at her curiously. “I made the spotted dick,” he offered, gesturing with his hand toward a duplicate of the same treat that was on the staff table. “I don’t know how to make macarons.”
“Drat,” Hermione half-cursed with a frustrated huff. There were only a few candidates left, she already knew what most of the remaining professors had made. “Do you know who did? I really need to know who made them.”
“Why, Miss Granger,” an unexpectedly deep voice drawled just behind her. Hermione turned to come face-to-face with the Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor, Severus. He was glancing down at her with a lifted eyebrow as he continued, “Is there something wrong with them?”
She tried to catch her breath, having lost it for another reason. When she was a girl, that tone of voice would have sent her into terror at having done something wrong, but now, it made shivers run down her spine that she knew were of an entirely different sort.
“Hello, Severus,” she squeaked out, trying to conceal her reaction as surprise. Hermione drew in a breath and shook her head, not wanting Severus to consider that he needed to investigate them on the idea that they were poisoned or tainted. “There is nothing wrong with them. I just need to know who made them.”
A slight tilt of his head was her response, his infamous dark eyes seemingly judging her as he held the silence, searching her features.
Hermione didn’t realize she was holding her breath until the need to breathe started to make her throat burn.
Severus glanced away, toward the table, before meeting her gaze again, with disapproval twisting his lips. “I thought the point of your little table was that it was meant to be anonymous until the end, to keep this lot from smashing each other’s cake.”
He was right, but Hermione didn’t care much for the rules at this moment, even rules she had instituted herself. Her whole focus was on finding out who had made the macarons and securing a trade for them before someone else got the same idea and beat her to the snitch. “It is, but I really must find who made them." She paused, a thought occurring to her. Severus never attended these events, and yet he was here. She did recall he had made a fudge the very first year at Minerva’s badgering and insisting, and it wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t heavenly like the cookies she sought. That didn’t mean there wasn’t a chance, surely if anyone would be able to create such a perfect confectionery, it would be a potions master, and Severus was a rather skilled one. “What did you make?”
He snorted. “What makes you think I made anything for this inane exercise?”
“Very well,” she sighed, knowing the question had been a long shot. There were still a few other options, and as she thought about it, she had remembered that one of the students had lamented how Professor Binns had not been able to participate due to his incorporeal state. Maybe one of the students had decided to create them in his stead. “I guess I could ask if someone made them for Binns so he could participate.”
Severus gave her no response, walking away from her without a word toward one of the other Slytherin displays.
For the next several hours, Hermione asked every single student, professor, and a few members of the board if they had made the macarons. No one knew who did, or if they did, they hadn’t confessed. Hermione was exhausted at this point and went back to the staff table, hoping that if she stood there, she might have a better chance of finding out who had made them.
Neville came up beside her, wiping his fingers on a napkin. “You look like you’ve run across the countryside.”
Hermione knew what Neville had made, but she hadn’t asked if he knew who made them. They were so good; perhaps they were a Hufflepuff creation. “Do you know who made the macarons?” She tried not to sound desperate. The supply of them at the table was dwindling, and that only made her feel a greater need to know who had made them. Hermione had managed to tuck a few more away, but they were not going to last the day.
Neville peeked at the nearly empty box of them with a smile. “No, but they were delicious.”
“I know, and that is why I need to find out who made them. They were better than sex,” she elaborated intensely, knowing that Neville was one of the few people whom she could safely say such a thing to.
He glanced around them and then at her with the stern look he often saved for students. “There are at least fifteen small children nearby whom I do not want to have to have that talk with anytime soon.”
“I know,” she countered, feeling only some small amount of shame, “But listen, I have never had a macaron as good as those before, and you know how much I love them.”
“They are your favorite.” He nodded, sending his napkin to the bin. “Who did you ask?”
“Everyone!” she announced in exasperation, rubbing her fingers against her temples. “And no one seems to know who made them.”
Neville glanced at his pocket watch and chuckled. “I mean, you will only have to wait a little while longer, and the judges will announce the winners, and I am sure they are going to win, so you can ask who made them then."
“I need to be the first to ask them to make me some.” Hermione wanted to be the first to know, the first to ask, so that she could be sure that she would not have to wait behind someone else to get access to the macarons. If she waited until everyone knew, then everyone would be asking that person to make them for them. It was obvious to her that they were going to win, but that was hardly the point anymore. “Do you know what I would do to not have to run into town every week to get macarons? What I would do to get more of these that have ruined me for any other macaron in my future?”
“Surely it is not that serious.” Neville cackled at her in disbelief.
“Neville, look at me,” she demanded, holding his gaze with her intent clearly on her face. “I am serious.”
A look of amusement settled over him as he shrugged, gesturing to the event. “Well, I will ask around, but if they didn’t tell you, they won’t tell me," he said as he moved away, and he paused, looking over her shoulder for a moment before glancing at her again. “Hey, did you notice that Severus actually came out for this? He never comes; maybe he made them.”
“He didn’t make anything,” she frowned with a saddened tone, knowing she’d already investigated that chance. "He told me so himself.”
While everyone else made their last-minute rounds to collect their favorite of the student treats, Hermione held her post at the staff table. She watched as the judges went to each house and class level, delivering the news of who had been selected as the first-place treat and given their points and awards. Finally, the last table was to be announced, and Hermione stood behind it, watching those gathered, trying to figure out the identity of the creator of her coveted treat. She’d managed to snatch the last two macarons, and she’d done her best to ration herself on the sweet treats, but she knew that they would only last until she made it to her rooms. Which is why she had to find out who could supply her with more.
As everyone stood in tense anticipation waiting for the final ruling, Hermione held her breath. When the minister announced that the winner of the staff baking challenge was the macarons, she was unsurprised. She watched eagerly for someone to come forward to claim their victory.
No one did.
So the minister flicked his wand toward the table, the labels revealing who made each item. Her name came up under the mostly eaten sponge cake, and the others she had been told and suspected were correct. Under the label for the macarons, an unexpected name curled into existence.
Severus Snape.
She jerked her head around, looking for the man, but he was nowhere in sight. Everyone else seemed to be looking for him too, but he was not anywhere in the room.
It was finally Minerva who mentioned that she’d seen him head toward his quarters just before the judging began.
Hermione did not wait.
While the other professors began to mill around, aiding the students in cleaning up, Hermione marched all the way to his quarters. She wasn’t exactly sure what she was going to do when she got there, as she was consumed with desperation for more of the macarons and fury and confusion over why he would lie about them and not tell her that he had made them. She’d spent the whole day trying to find the baker, and it had been him all along.
She banged her fist against his door, trying to find all the words she wanted to say to him.
It swung open and he glanced at her coolly.
“You.” She half panted and half gasped.
He crossed his arms over his chest, clearly unimpressed. “Highest NEWTS in the history of the test, and that is the extent of your statement.”
“You made the macarons!” Hermione managed to articulate it as both an accusation and a surprised realization.
“It seems I did,” he replied, a smug smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.
“Why didn’t you tell me when I asked?” she demanded, gesturing behind her toward the Great Hall where the event had taken place. “I ran over the whole event trying to find out who made them.”
Severus was unaffected by her question as he slowly drew his words out. “It was meant to be confidential.”
He had her there; it was supposed to be anonymous. Taking in a deep breath, she knew that if she pushed him for why he didn’t tell her, it would possibly cut off her chances of getting him to make more for her. This would not be as easy as asking nicely. Severus did not do anything out of the generosity of his heart; it was not how he operated, and she knew it. If she wanted something from Severus, she was going to owe him something in return.
Straightening her posture, Hermione calmed herself. “What do I have to do to get some from you?”
Her bluntness made that smirk deepen.
She did her best to quiet the immediately heated reaction her body had to such an expression on her face. This was not the time for her desires for the man to complicate her desire for the man’s cookies.
“Why do you want them so bad?” Severus pried, narrowing his eyes at her in scrutiny.
There had to be a way to explain to him without going into detail; surely he would be repulsed by her equating them to a life-changing, almost orgasmic experience. Maybe if she flattered him, told him they were better than the ones she could get at a shop, that might give her a little leverage to get him to make them for her. “They are the best macarons I’ve ever had; they are better—”
“—than sex." He cut her off with a roll of his eyes. “I did hear you tell Longbottom that. I almost pity your romantic partner if they can be replaced with a bit of meringue and cream.”
Hermione furrowed her forehead in confusion. She didn’t have a romantic partner, not since Ron had broken up with her so he could ‘sow his wild oats.' “They would have to exist first, and since they don't, they are easily replaced by macarons. And I will happily replace them with your macarons.”
His expression changed, his arms uncrossed, the scrutiny less severe. “So, your weekly nighttime excursions are not to meet with some secret paramour you’ve managed to evade the press with.”
Blinking, she stared at him for a moment. How did he know that she ran out to the shops every weekend to get more treats, and why did he think she was wandering off to rendezvous with anything other than sweets and an occasional bottle of wine? “No, they are for me to make it in time to the nearest Tesco to get bakery macarons.”
“I see,” Severus replied. “So you already have a supply of macarons. What do you want mine for?"
Because those macarons don’t make my toes curl…
Because those macarons do not make me weak in the knees…
Because those macarons will never satisfy me the way yours have now that I have had them….
Because your macarons have ruined me for all other macarons and I shall never be satisfied again…
All thoughts she did not dare say aloud.
“Severus, just, what is your price?” she quietly pleaded. “What do I need to do in order to get you to make them for me?”
Perplexity passed over his face, mingling with surprise that did not feel rehearsed or controlled. “You don’t want my recipe; you wish for me to make them for you?”
“I have tried and devastatingly failed to make them before, so the recipe would mean nothing to me,” Hermione explained, still recalling how long it took to get the smell of almond flour out of her kitchen. She’d had to scrub her counters several times because of the sticky mess she’d made, and she swore to never try again and potentially ruin her love for the decadent treat. His recipe would do no good in her hands; they needed to be made exactly the way he had made them today. “Yes, I want you to make them for me. What do you want in exchange?”
Severus stared at her pensively, the moment drawing out so long that she had wondered if he wasn’t going to answer her question all together and was just waiting for her to give up and walk away.
Not that she would in this circumstance; she’d stare at him all day if she must. Not that she didn’t mind the view; she’d become an appreciator of his Romanesque features during many a staff meeting when she was disinterested in the argument between Pomona and Filius turning into one of his long-winded filibusters to get what he wanted.
“There isn’t anything particular that I want. What are you offering?” he finally broke the silence.
“Anything, name it,” Hermione confessed, ready to clear out her bank account in order to have a regular fresh-made supply of cookies.
He crossed his threshold, stepping so close she almost took a step back as he loomed over her. “I would warn you to be careful, in case I decide I want something you aren’t prepared to give.” His voice came out a daring rumble that washed over her, trickling down her spine and making her body tingle.
Clenching her fist so she didn’t do something stupid like pull him closer to her, Hermione swallowed down the arousal his action had just caused, thinking that he was trying to bluff her out of her request. “I think you underestimate what I am willing to give in this situation.”
“Are you sure about that?” he almost purred, black eyes boring into hers. “I could ask for something indecent, something scandalous, something intimate and personal.”
Her breath stuttered backward in her throat, her whole body suddenly felt flush, and Hermione knew there was no way he wouldn’t be able to tell that she was blushing. But he wouldn’t get her to balk and back down either. “You could ask me for all of those things, and for those macarons, you would get them.”
“Very well,” he whispered, his eyes drifting down before he caught her gaze again. “If you are so certain you will do anything for them, let me prove you wrong.”
“What do you mean, prove me wrong how?” Hermione asked in confusion, wondering if she had misheard him because she’d gotten distracted watching his lips wrap around his every word.
Somehow, he stepped impossibly closer, his voice so quiet but so deep that it vibrated her bones. “Let me prove to you that my macarons aren’t that good, that they are not better than sex.”
“Oh.” The word escaped her, half as a moan, half as a gasp, because of all the things she expected he would bargain for, it would not be that.
Severus stepped back from her, a look that was somewhere between a sneer and a frown carving across his face. “I did warn you that you might not be willing to give what I asked for."
“Right now?” Hermione asked him pointedly, drawing her gaze from his lips slowly down to his boots before back up.
He started, shoulders jerking back. “Pardon.”
Clearing her throat, she reclosed the distance, bravely placing her hand on the front of his frock coat and hoping that she would come back with a hand after this. “Are you going to prove it to me right now, or do I have to wait for the first batch to do a side-by-side comparison?"
His nostrils flared as he glanced down at her hand and then into her eyes. A heat sank into his expression, and he placed his hand over hers against his chest.
“Now,” he growled, forcefully, yanking her into the open door with him. As soon as they were past the threshold, he closed the door with a thundering slam.
His lips crashed against hers, and Hermione buried her fingers into the front of his coat, pulling him down to her as much as she was pulling herself up to meet his intensity. His hands wrapped around her waist, thumbs pressing into her stomach as she felt herself bodily lifted off of her feet. Her back hit the door before she could even catch her breath, her body pressed between the solid wood door and the solid man holding her up.
Releasing her hold, she grabbed hold of his shoulders, feeling the tension in his body under thick layers of fabric as she wrapped her legs around his torso.
Severus leaned back slightly, gasping with wide eyes, searching her face with frantically moving eyes. Before Hermione could ask him what he was thinking, he descended on her again, his lips brushing against her chin before he kissed the front of her neck.
Curling her fingers into his hair as she grasped the back of his head, Hermione let her head thud against the door behind her.
“I am going to make you moan like you did this morning,” he growled against her neck in a dangerous promise, “and then I am going to make you moan like you never have before.”
Her core clenched, her thighs gripping him as his intentions burned through her. She gasped out; whatever words she said were lost to her as his hands shifted, grabbing her ass and pulling her into him as he ground against her.
“Unwrap your legs,” he commanded, his hand moving to press against the inside of her thigh. “Wrap your arms around my neck.”
It took her brain longer than normal to get her body to obey, and she crossed her arms behind his neck, letting go of him with her legs.
Severus pressed her upper back against the door, she supposed, in order to use it to support her as he busied his hands with the button and zip on her trousers. When the button would not give, he cursed into her ear. Long fingers dug into her waistband, each hand holding one side of the opening. He jerked his hands sharply in opposite directions, and she felt the strength he used in that moment through his chest as the button clattered to the floor and the fabric finally parted. Cold air hit her skin as her trousers and underwear followed the button to the floor in successive thuds.
His hot breath washed down her neck as he shifted again, warm hands on bare skin as he pressed her into the door again. Hermione rolled herself against him, the roughness of his clothes giving her some satisfaction as she turned her face and pressed kisses against every part of him she could reach: his hair, his temple, his eyebrow, and the space under his ear.
Another break in the pressure of his body against hers as his hand slipped between them. “Oh, fuck,” he half hissed, half groaned as he undid his own trousers. “You’ve soaked my coat right through.”
“I’m not sorry.” Hermione laughed, tilting his face with her hand so that she could seize his lips. She slipped her tongue into his mouth, mimicking what she wanted him to do with her as she flicked it against his tongue, gasping into him.
Severus sucked in a breath through his nose, kissing her back as he pressed into her again, this time skin against skin. He pulled both her legs against him, digging his fingers into the back of her thighs as his length slipped between her folds, teasing what was to come. Her spine arched as she felt him drag against her clit, sending a jolt of pleasure through her, making her lean her head back against the door. "Oh god.”
“I would prefer Severus,” he hoarsely corrected her, kissing the front of her throat again, as he adjusted himself to line up with her. “Say it,” he demanded as he simultaneously jerked into her while pulling her down on to him. “Say my name.”
“Severus!” she cried out as her jaw dropped at the sensation of being filled by him.
A deep gravelly moan escaped him, and Hermione tilted her head forward, seeing that he had his eyes closed in ecstasy. Knowing that she did that, that he reacted like that to her sent a spiral of lust and need down her spine, causing her to clench around him. His eyes opened, pupils wide and hungry as he gazed at her like a man in the desert who had fallen upon an oasis. Severus kissed her as he drew out of her, his lips grazing her chin in a downward march along her throat with a thrust of his hips.
Not one to be passive, but in a position where her arms were her only point of control, she wrapped herself around him, fingers grasping and clinging to his back as he drove exquisite pleasure into her. Each thrust stretched her, driving him impossibly deeper until he bottomed out, plunging into her to the hilt. She slid up and down the wall, her blouse riding up and bunching behind her shoulder blades as the tempo increased.
“Fuck, Severus,” she moaned out as the first warning sign of her impending orgasm rocketed through her like a firework. Another convulsion, the muscles in her back tensing as she sank down on him, hips meeting flush before he withdrew just as quickly.
“I’m going to cum!” the words strangled out of her as he sucked against her throat, hands squeezing her ass as he pounded her into the door.
“Then cum, Hermione,” he rasped huskily into her skin.
Her name in his voice shot right to her groin, her jaw falling open as the first wave of pleasure annihilated her ability to think. Eyes slammed shut as she shrieked a jumbled collection of syllables that sounded like a curse and his name merged together.
Severus did not stop his movements, pulling her down on to him with each upswing of his hips, drawing as much pleasure from her as her body would give him until she slumped over his shoulders, sucking in air like she’d never get enough of it again.
It took her a moment to get her bearings, to cement her position in the world, and once she did, she was acutely aware of the fact that he was still inside her and still hard. Pushing her hair back from her face, she glanced at him with a sex-drunk smile.
“Can you stand?” he asked with that same gravely husk in his voice.
She nodded, releasing the vice hold she had on his hips with her legs, her toes barely touching the ground.
Severus groaned as he withdrew from her, settling her to her feet. There was a cautious glint in his eyes as he did not look her in the face as he tried to take a step back from the door. “That was —”
Holding on to him for balance, she curled her hand behind his neck, forcing him to come down to her level for a kiss and make him stop talking. Something in her knew that if he kept talking, he was going to talk his way out of whatever this was; he was going to push her away. Hermione had not yearned and longed for this man for nearly five years to have him shag her and then send her away. Also, she wasn’t going to give up this easily on getting her macarons.
A huff of surprise left him as his hands found her sides, warm against her sweat-slick skin, as he kissed her back.
One moment, they were kissing, the intensity building again as his hands slipped up under her blouse, and in the next moment, they were tumbling to the floor, her knees having given out from the exercise and him trying to catch her as she went. They landed with her half on his chest, his hand under her face as it hit the floor.
Ever the opportunist, Hermione summoned the energy to climb on top of him before he could get to his feet. Leaning forward, she kissed him again, just as intensely as when this had begun.
“Are you still not satisfied that my macarons aren’t better than sex?" he mumbled against her lips, catching her bottom lip between his teeth.
Hermione shifted her hips, feeling his hardness slide against her, just enough to graze the sensitive bundle of nerves. “No, I’m not. You may need to be more convincing.”
Severus stilled her movement with his hands firmly grasping her thighs, his dark eyes peering up into hers as if he were searching for meaning behind her words. “Perhaps I was too rash in my first demonstration,” he hummed darkly.
Grinning, Hermione tensed against his grasp, sliding herself back so that she was sitting on his thighs. “Why don’t you let me take the lead for this attempt?” she teased, grasping him in her hands. She pushed his frock coat up, giving herself a clear view of him while she stoked him, thumbing the tip before firmly squeezing down to the base.
His eyes shut again, his jaw quivering slightly as he dug his fingers into her knees. He sucked in a sharp breath when she released him, glancing at her with that same feral look he had given her when he dragged her into the room. “By all means, take liberties with my person.”
It was something that she was sure would have sounded like a snide comment if it hadn’t been said with such a deep voice and the bright hungry yearning in his eyes. Instead, it made her wetter, made her want to skip the foreplay and ride him until she was in bliss again. Already she felt her gut clench in warm anticipation. She looked at him, lying on his back, still buttoned up to his neck, and she knew that she wanted to feel the press of his body against hers. She gestured to the buttons with a flick of her finger, frowning at him. ‘We are still far too dressed.”
Severus gave her a single questioning look before he whispered a word, drawing his finger down along the line of buttons on his chest. Each button neatly slipped out of its button hole, his frock coat falling open to reveal an undershirt that received the same treatment. “Your turn,” he urged darkly, pressing up on his elbows as he shrugged off the rest of his clothing, the cravat flung to the side.
Grabbing the bottom of her blouse, she pulled it over her head, sending it to the floor beside her before unclasping her bra. She didn’t fully have it off before his hands were on her, cupping her breasts and running his thumbs over her nipples.
“Merlin, your breasts are glorious,” he exhaled reverently as her bra joined the rest of the discarded clothing.
She slid forward on his lap, hovering over him, one hand wrapped around his base. “I prefer, Hermione,” she told him, before sinking down, taking in each perfect inch of his cock. “Say it,” she turned his own phrasing against him, staring at him with a heated smile.
Black eyes locked on hers as a soft gasp escaped him, his hands gripping her breasts.
“Hermione.” He said it with a weighty finality, as if something were being staked into the ground to never be moved again. It was as if Severus now possessed her name and no one else would ever be able to say it right again.
She shuddered, the feeling going from the top of her head to her toes. Placing her hands on his stomach, she dug her knees into the carpet on either side of him and pushed herself up. She mourned the loss, and before he was fully out of her, she was dropping down on him again. She was not normally so eager for more after an orgasm, but there was something about this, about Severus, that made her want to take all she could get from him in this moment.
His hands continued their caressing worship of her breasts as she bounced experimentally, figuring out how far she could lift before he would slide out of her.
Severus leaned forward, one arm wrapping around her back as he drew her nipple into his mouth. It was another added sensation to the mounting pleasure, to the tightening that she felt with every descent on to him. His arm around her tightened, and he bent his knees, changing the angle of her movements.
“Fuck,” he hissed into her skin, trailing kisses to her other breast.
It slipped through her like encouragement as she increased the rhythm of her movements, her breath catching with every time she took him fully into her. Severus let her nipple go, one hand pulling her to him for a kiss. He drew her forward with that hand, sliding her against his chest as he lay back against the ground. She protested slightly until his hand left the back of her head, his teeth gently on the bottom lip keeping her from sitting up as he kissed and sucked on it. His hands grabbed her hips, guiding her movement as he used his bent knees to thrust up with her every down moment.
A moan escaped her, coming from so deep within her and being so loud she was sure that it echoed back to her, and she pressed her forehead against his. Her body tensed around him once, twice, and then finally she was digging her fingers into his pecs, squirming in pleasure as the first tremors of an orgasm rolled over her.
Inspired, Severus plunged into her with vigor until his own breathing was sharp and erratic, his body tense under her hands. He pressed his heels into the floor, thrusting up, and it felt like he had knocked the wind out of her as her body succumbed to the white thoughtlessness of euphoria. She felt him shudder, felt the erratic bounce of their hips before he held her flush, and the hot sensation of being filled swarmed her.
Hermione collapsed against his chest, breathing in the sweaty musk of him and sex, and let the world slowly stop spinning. His heartbeat and his panting breaths became her anchor, the symphony that drew her from her orgasm-fueled delirium. She did not want to move; she had no desire to break whatever enchantment was holding this moment together. Closing her eyes, she snuggled her face into his chest, wrapping her arms around his side, and hoped that he would not be insistent on ceasing this post-coital bliss.
It wasn’t until he pulled his frock coat over them that she had even realized she’d begun to shiver as the cold of the room seeped into her.
“Have I changed your mind?” Severus whispered, his hand sliding up her bare skin under the heavy coat.
Hermione took in a deep breath, weighing her options. This was possibly, no, not possibly, assuredly the best sex she’d ever had, but also, the macarons were the best macarons she'd ever had. One was obviously more satisfying, but she could not, in her sluggish, hormone-flooded mind, remember if the agreement was that if he changed her mind she got macarons or if she didn’t if he changed her mind. Unable to recall, she huffed, opening her eyes to look up at him. “Do I still get the macarons if you proved me wrong?”
A rough laugh escaped him, his hand gripping her and holding her into place on top of him. “I will make you as many as you want as long as we can do that again.”
“Right now?” Hermione perked up, even as her body told her that she did not have it in her for another mind-blowing round with him.
“No,” Severus groaned, rolling his eyes. “Perhaps in the morning, if you are still here, if you want to be here.” There was some hesitation in his voice as he said those words, as if he didn’t understand that while this had started over his macarons, this was exactly where she had been trying to find a way to be for years.
“Of course I will be here in the morning,” she replied, stretching forward and pressing a kiss to his lips, hopefully to ease whatever concern he had. “I have wanted to wake up in your bed for over five years, and now I get to have you have to make me macarons.”
“In that case, might I suggest we get to the bed so that you can wake up in it?" Severus offered, shifting in such a way that told her he was not comfortable lying on the floor as they were. Hermione scooted gently down his body, grabbing ahold of the arm of a sofa to get herself to her feet. She stood there, his frock coat draped over her shoulders, as he got to his own feet.
Hermione glanced around the room, having not actually taken any of it in when she’d been pulled in. The table was covered with cookbooks, ingredients, and other baking utensils, and the rest of the room was filled with books and parchment and journals.
“Forgive the mess; this was not part of my plan.” He got to his feet, following her gaze, and cleared his throat. “Had I known making your favorite treat would have had you in my bed this quickly, I would have made it the first year.”
He said this had not been part of his plan, but that meant that he had a plan. What was his plan, and how did her favorite macarons feature in it?
How did he know they were her favorite?
“You knew they were my favorite?” she gasped, turning quickly in his direction.
“I did, but not to the extent that it would lead us here." He gestured to the crumpled clothing on the floor in various piles. Her bra had ended up draped from the corner of a lamp.
“Let me gather my clothing,” she offered, bending to pick up her blouse and holding it to her chest.
“Don’t bother; I don’t suspect we will need them until morning,” he mused, the weight of his gaze roaming over her, sinking into her skin. “Unless you object to future attempts to reaffirm that my baking is not my best skill.”
“No objections,” she smiled. “But I do have a few more macarons, and we could do a small side-by-side test.”
Severus shook his head, folding his arms over his chest. Somehow, he still managed to look intimidating while completely naked. “I did not say you could eat macarons in my bed; I won’t sleep with crumbs.”
“Fine,” she relented, walking over to where her bag had fallen by the door. She opened the box, popping one of the lemon yellow ones into her mouth, closing her eyes as the meringue melted on her tongue. Pleasure of a different kind than she’d just experienced with him swept through her. Hermione could feel his eyes on her and feel the weight of his presence, and the joy from the cookie just did not compare to that. She opened her eyes and smirked at him, licking the tip of her finger. “I do have to say they are still orgasmic macarons. Just not better than sex with you.”