Love Wears a Mask

Love Wears a Mask

Chapter Four: Love Plays No Games

The hot Southern Calfornian sun beat relentlessly down on Hermione's wide-brimmed straw hat, throwing her features into striking shadow. She wore a low-necked sundress that, while by no means form-fitting, fitted her hourglass form with seamless perfection. A brand new, pure white tennis racket swung from her lightly-tanned hand as she casually stepped onto the tennis court of the Palm Coast resort. It would be a pity if she were forced to try to play tennis alone; her smooth brow creased in mild disapproval at the empty playing area. Perhaps she would come back later... A footstep echoed behind her, and she spun to see who it was. Standing before her, his rich-hued brown threads of hair gleaming in stark contrast to his tennis whites, his racket jauntily cocked against his shoulder, was Ocard.

"Good morning." Somehow he managed to make those three innocuous syllables seem infinitely...well, sexy was really the only word for it, despite the casual tone he used. "Do you play?" he asked, glancing down at her racket.

"A bit," she replied breezily, her easygoing voice in frank denial of the suddenly heavy pounding of her fluttering heart.

"How...convenient," he said with a smile that turned her weak at the knees. "I'm heading out to the court myself. Care for a match?"

"Oh, no thank you. I don't smoke." Confusion was born suddenly in his masculine features, and she realized with a flush of embarrassment that she had mistaken his meaning in her temporary state of mental oblivion due to his intoxicating proximation. She laughed quickly, trying to usurp her humiliating blunder. He joined her belatedly, obviously assuming she had actually meant to be witty.

Before he could observe the comely flush that suffused her alabaster cheeks in embarrassment, she traipsed hurriedly to the other side of the court, raising her racket coquettishly and indicating that she was ready to begin whenever he was, in turn. "Shall we warm up, then?" she trilled playfully.

"No need, is there?" he returned in a throbbingly masculine voice, bringing his racket down in an expertly aimed swing at the ball which appeared in his hand as if by magic. She was stunned by his sudden movements and watched in purely aesthetic appreciation of his muscular coordination, turning herself only too late to the matter at hand. Her hasty return swing caught the ball on the edge of her racket, barely sending it back over the net; it hit the green court well outside the boundary line, and it was Ocard's point. His eyes gleamed at her over the net, and she returned the look with a level, challenging stare.

Several volleys later, his finely-crafted eyebrow had risen a half inch in indication of his astonishment at her level of mastery of the game; it was now her serve, and Hermione was sufficiently tuned in to the game that her forehead and temples had begun to shine with light perspiration. She felt exuberantly involved in their physical competition, and was enjoying immensely the unparalleled opportunity to watch the work of art that was her opponent in finely directed motion. His musculature was admirably suited to the game, as it was to observation.

She drew back her arm, calling out to him. "Now that I'm sufficiently warmed up, Ocard, I'm prepared to offer you a rather more formidable challenge." He laughed once, a sound that would have been mocking were it not so warm and...sexy. Somehow, her mind seemed to fixate on that particular adjective whenever he was present.

A second later, she had loosed her serve, which she was prepared to send soaring straight to the back of his court. The swing was one smooth motion running from her toes straight up through her toned body, along her arm to her wrist and finally resting on the racket she held with a firm grip; the contact was made, and she felt the impact of the ball directly in the center of the racket. Yet something was wrong; the impact felt far more intense than had any of her previous swings. As she continued into the follow through, a shockwave seemed to follow directly opposite the earlier path of her motion, shaking her from her fingertips right back down to her toes; Hermione gasped as the world exploded in a haze of fire....

The carriage floor jerked along beneath her, causing Hermione to shift uncomfortably on the leather-covered seat as she was awakened from a deep, heavy slumber. Her thick eyelashes fluttered briefly and then lifted, and her astonished brown eyes were surprised to meet the intensely gazing libidinous blue eyes of Ronald Weasley.

"Ron," she said in confusion at the strangely preoccupied façade he exuded to the world, and most particularly exuded to her, as she was the one his attentions were drawn to. She wondered musingly for how great a period of time on the train ride he had watched her while she dozed. "What are you looking at?"

He shook himself violently, averting his gaze from her face and turning away. "Nothing," he returned hoarsely, his gaze strenuously averted.

She rose fluidly to her feet and peered about the carriage of the Hogwarts Express, noting as she did so its complete and utter emptiness except for the aforementioned presences of both herself and Ron. Suddenly, the train lurched; the carriage fell into blackness and Hermione fell into Ron's arms.

"Where's Harry, Ron?" Hermione whispered, winded from the sudden collision.

"Oh, Hermione," Ron whispered huskily. "Does Harry matter here? Now?" And with that, he covered her mouth in a passionate, voracious kiss.

It was several moments later before Hermione was able again to free her lips from his attentions. When she did so, she breathed in a deep gasp of air and choked out, "Ron, do you really think--" she was cut off briefly for a moment, then pulled herself back once again-- "this is the place or the time?"

He drew back, this time of his own violation, and replied in a voice husky with emotion, "If not here, where? And if not now, when?"

Nowhere, never!

gasped some remote portion of her brain. The rest of her mind was preoccupied, however, not with answering passion at the advances he had made but with confusion and a freezing paralysis. She finally listened to the rational section of her brain and managed a reply. "Ron, I just think... I don't know if this is best... We really should do our homework, don't you think?" Her voice ended on a note of desperation.

The lights flickered on just in time for Hermione to catch the look of incredulity that suffused Ron's amply freckled features. Hermione must have been wearing an interesting mask of her own because when Harry opened the door to the compartment, he hesitated for a moment before entering. "I hope I didn't interrupt anything," Harry joked, cracking a smile and giving a baritone chuckle. The red that grew somehow brighter on Ron and the nonchalance with which Harry commenced eating a sandwich convinced Hermione that Harry's jibe had been completely innocent.

"No," Ron muttered, his voice sullen with frustration as he released Hermione's waist, "We were just doing... homework."

She sank slowly down into her seat, the blood pounding in her ears and her head spinning in confusion. Her heart beat at twice its normal rate, thumping against her ribs until she feared that the bone would splinter and crack or the heart itself burst from exertion, whichever happened first.

Harry frowned down at her. "Candy--Candy, are you all right, my darling?"

That felt wrong, somehow. Harry didn't know about her little nickname, and she was anything but his darling, Witch Weekly articles notwithstanding.

"For Merlin's sake, my darling Candy, will you not awaken?"

Her thick eyelashes fluttered briefly and then lifted, and her astonished brown eyes were surprised to meet the intensely gazing concerned silver eyes of Ocard, her knight in shining armor. Except for the fact that he was neither wearing armor nor a knight. In fact, he was a wizard. Close enough, she thought, as she gazed into Ocard's deep, misty spheres.