Chapter Text
So passed another midnight with another man, another remix of the same song pumping from the speakers. Draco rattled the ice in his glass and wondered when in the hell his life got so fucking dull.
It probably didn’t look dull from an outside perspective. Not everyone wiled away their nights sprawled across a leather sofa at the back of a nightclub, chased every sunset with a shot of Ogden’s, or spent more hours ensconced in darkness beneath the buzzing glow of neon than daylight. Draco’s life likely appeared downright debauched to the type of man who went home to a loving wife and children, those buttoned-up Ministry men, choked to compliance by their own neckties. The sorts of men who said things like, ‘fine weather we’re having,’ and, ‘did you catch the match last night?’ and, ‘no, thank you, I’ve had enough,’ were the same men who called Draco a slag, a pouf, a fairy, simply because instead of reading bedtime stories to brats, Draco found himself with a lap full of writhing, half-naked twenty-something, cock peeking from his ludicrously small shorts, and leaking against the front of Draco’s expensive trousers.
He stifled a grimace, trying not to shift too obviously beneath Ethan’s—Aaron’s?—weight as the bloke went for his neck. He was tempted to shove him to the floor and go get another drink, but despite what people said, he wasn’t a total monster. If he was lucky, the poor chap would come in his shorts and then trot off to the washroom, allowing Draco to hit the bar.
Draco knew he had no right to complain. He had a beautiful creature pressed against him, a posh flat with a view, and a business of his own. He ran Effugia, the most popular wizarding nightclub in South London. His life was bloody enviable. So why did everything feel so grey, washed out, the same?
Draco used to love this life, when the parties, the drugs, and the glamour were enough to sustain him. Perhaps he’d grown jaded over the years, the transition from extravagance to destitution and back again leaving him numb. He couldn’t pinpoint exactly when things changed, only that it didn’t happen all at once, instead creeping, slow and duplicitous, until it had him by the throat.
Draco tipped his empty glass to his lips, crunching the ice between his teeth, wondering if he dumped the rest of it down the pretty bloke’s pants if he’d come or scramble away, cursing.
Before Draco had the chance to find out, Greg appeared next to him, clearing his throat.
Draco suppressed a yelp of surprise. The bastard was like a damned cat, materialising from the shadows, dressed in a black suit like all members of Draco’s security team.
“You’ve got a VIP incoming,” he said, eyes fixed straight ahead, pointedly ignoring the nearly naked man in Draco’s lap thanks to years of dedicated practice.
“Is it the Keeper for Puddlemere again? The rowdy one?” Draco snapped his fingers, racking his brain. “Jackson something?”
Greg gave a sharp shake of his head.
Draco stilled the man in his lap with a hand at his hip. Aaron—Allen? Fuck, he needed to write this shit down—let out a pathetic mewl that had Draco gritting his teeth.
“Who is it?” he asked.
Greg turned to him now, eyebrows raised and chin lowered, his expression heavy with implication.
Draco ended up shoving the bloke off his lap after all, causing him to stumble away as Draco abruptly stood.
“Go on, pet,” Draco said, swatting his arse as he shuffled past. “Free drinks at the bar.”
Ethan muttered, adjusting himself in his shorts, but as soon as he was beyond the barrier surrounding Draco’s private section of the lounge, Draco spun on Greg.
“Who is it?” he asked again.
“It’s Potter.”
Draco’s heart rate tripled. “No!” he gasped. “He’s here?”
“Just through security. Heading for the bar.”
Draco released an undignified exclamation of excitement and punched Greg in his meaty arm. “This ought to be good.”
He pushed past Greg, straightening his trousers and the drape of his shirt with a swipe of his hand. He fished his wand from his pocket to mutter a spell at the mess left by Ethan’s rutting before leaning over the railing, looking down on the pulsing club below. The tightly packed bodies on the dance floor writhed and swayed, bathed in the colourful, ever-changing lights. There was more skin on display than clothing—beautiful people as far as the eye could see, but Draco had no trouble skipping across the sea of strangers to find him.
And there he was, just as Greg promised, huddled next to two other blokes by the bar, a shot in one hand and a pint in the other.
Harry Potter.
Draco’s hands tightened on the railing as he bit down on a grin. It was like glimpsing a unicorn, right here in the middle of Draco’s club!
Potter sightings were rare. The Prophet threw around words like ‘recluse,’ and ‘hermit,’ and ‘severely antisocial’, but Draco often wondered if Potter hid in plain sight. To anyone else, he was easy to look past. He didn’t stand out; his face obscured by dark-rimmed glasses and an overlong mop of jet-black hair. He wore clothing in neutral colours with no noticeable style beyond their function and there was nothing significant about his stature—neither tall nor short, not skinny nor particularly broad. One might call him wiry, his t-shirt stretching across his shoulders and skimming his waist, belying a promise of muscle definition. Or maybe that was just Draco’s wishful thinking.
He didn’t stand proudly as one might expect, instead curling in on himself, head down and shoulders rounded, his chin tipped to one side, watching the crowd with a crooked half smile.
Oh, but those fucking dimples.
Draco groaned, fourteen years old all over again.
He realised belatedly that the man standing next to Potter with an elbow propped on his shoulder was none other than his boyhood shadow, Ronald Weasley. It should have been immediately obvious with his shock of red hair, but Draco couldn’t be expected to notice a single other person in the room when Potter stood right there. And anyway, Weasley’s presence was of no consequence. It wasn’t his first visit to Effugia, nor his second. Not even his fifth. Draco was inclined to ignore him so long as he paid his usually modest tab, and didn’t cause any trouble. Draco was a businessman, after all. If he started turning away everyone who spat on him in the early years after the war, he wouldn’t make a Galleon. And Draco liked his Galleons.
Weasley came in now and again, enjoyed his wild night out, and left at dawn when the doors locked behind his drunk arse, and Draco said nary a word. He didn’t even blink in his direction. But never once had he brought Potter.
Eyes glued to Potter’s messy hair, Draco groped behind himself until he caught the back of a chair, dragging it closer. He dropped into it, arms folded over the railing, and watched as Potter tossed back the shot of whatever he was holding—something brown and probably resembling swill if his preferences were anything like Weasley’s. Draco tipped forward onto the front two legs of the chair, willing Potter to look up and see him, but his attention remained fixed on Weasley and their other nameless and unimportant companion.
Someone placed a fresh drink in Draco’s hand—probably Greg because he was fantastic like that—and he sipped idly without tasting, waiting until… yes! There it was. Potter was recognised.
Not five feet away, two girls in short skirts and towering heels began whispering furiously behind their hands, eyes flicking towards him. Potter flinched like he could sense their attention, which was impossible because they stood at his back, and the music in the club was so loud it left ears ringing well into the next day.
Propelled by an insistent push from her friend, one girl stumbled forward, then straightened, brushing a manicured hand against Potter’s arm. She was a pretty thing, leggy with doe eyes, and when Potter turned, she looked at him through her lashes, dipping closer to speak into his ear. Potter glanced over at Weasley, who grinned and shrugged in a way that clearly said, ‘go for it,’ and Potter did exactly that.
He took a long drink from his pint, draining half of it in one go, then passed it off to Weasley as the girl tugged him onto the dance floor.
Potter was a shit dancer, that much was clear right away. Draco stifled a laugh into his glass, but the girl seemed unbothered that Potter possessed all the grace of a baby Erumpent. She wrapped herself around him, lips pressed against his ear, moving around words Draco was suddenly desperate to hear.
He twirled his wand between his fingers and muttered an eavesdropping spell he learned from a Russian card-shark he met back when he was bartending in Knockturn Alley to pay the rent. Though not strictly legal, nor particularly polite, it was one of many handy spells in Draco’s arsenal. He reckoned he had the right to know what was going on in his club, and if he had to employ magic of questionable morality to do so, then so be it. Wouldn’t be the worst thing he’d ever done.
As the spell engaged, the thud of the bass and the roar of the crowd gentled to a background hum, and a single voice rang out, clear as Waterford crystal.
“I still have your poster on my wall. And a copy of the spread you did for Witch Weekly in 2004. I was only a fourth year back then, but it was so brilliant. Everyone thought so. Is it true that you know the Minister? And that you hang out with both Oliver Wood and Viktor Krum from the International Quidditch League? What is Hermione Granger like? My friend Victoria met her in a lift once—”
Draco dropped the spell with a disappointed sigh. The silly girl had Harry Potter pressed against her, the opportunity of a lifetime, and she wanted to do—what? Ask him for an autograph? What a waste!
And dull. Endlessly, painfully dull.
Draco slumped back in his chair, crossing his legs and draining his glass.
Were Draco in her position, he wouldn't squander it on useless fangirling. His first move would probably be a solid grope because even from his perch in the balcony, Draco could make out the shape of Potter’s arse in his jeans, and bloody hell. He could bounce a Galleon off that thing. After Potter inevitably hexed him and kneed him in the bollocks for copping a feel, Draco would ask the question they all wanted the answer to: where the fuck had he been hiding all these years?
As far as the public was concerned, Potter was a ghost. The only indication that he hadn’t fled England ages ago were the rare paparazzi photographs, blurry shots of him with Granger, a gaggle of Weasleys, or one of his other Gryffindor handlers. He was never publicly attached to anyone, never married, never settled down. He simply appeared, sparingly and without warning, within the pages of cheap corner shop tabloids, looking gruff, scowly, and brutally fit.
It wasn’t always that way. There was a time when Potter was absolutely everywhere, and it nearly drove Draco to madness. The papers paraded him across the front page: the newest recruit to the Auror Corps, the Weaslette on his arm, smiling. Then there was the legendary April 2002 Witch Weekly spread. Draco bought three copies despite being so broke he could barely afford supper. He told a dubious Pansy it was an investment, when in actuality, it was because they got Potter to take his top off for the photo shoot and Draco needed backups in case something happened to one of his other copies.
And then? Nothing. Like a cloud of breath exhaled on a chilly night, he disappeared. The official statement from the DMLE was simply that Potter left, no further explanation given. His friends were tight-lipped as well, leaving the public to speculate. And Merlin, did they speculate.
There was a rumour Potter joined the Unspeakables and was fighting dark wizards on the continent, and another that he suffered Aconite poisoning and was locked away in St Mungo’s. Some insisted he wore glamours in public, and suddenly anyone could be Harry Potter. The press, vultures that they were, gobbled it up, bones, blood, and all.
Potter had nothing to worry about here, in Draco’s club. Draco didn’t let cameras within one hundred feet of the place. It brought him high regards from celebrities, royals, and public figures who didn’t want their whereabouts (or their company) publicised. The really desperate reporters tried to pay him off, but since the papers never spared Draco anything but scathing reproach, they could get fucked.
Good on him because England’s lost Chosen One was here, looking like a complete arse, attempting to sway to the music. It took everything in Draco to stay put when all he wanted to do was scurry down the stairs like an overexcited schoolboy and start pestering him. He moved restlessly, swivelling in his chair, pacing the balcony, making overly large gestures to his bartender, hoping to catch Potter’s attention. But it was in vain. Potter’s focus remained fixed on some witless woman.
If he hadn’t been so intent on watching Potter, Draco might have missed the man cutting through the crowd with singular purpose. He bowled aside anyone in his path, leaving a trail of irritated club-goers cursing at his back. He halted when he reached Potter, huffing air like a great horned bull, before spinning him around with a forceful hand on his shoulder.
The girl stumbled away, shouting at the man, while Potter stood there blinking at them, dark brows knitted together.
Words were exchanged, first between the girl and the angry man, then between him and Potter. The man’s face twisted, purpling, and Potter started talking faster, shaking his head with both hands raised.
This man was either from out of town, vision impaired, or a complete fucking idiot, because he appeared to be threatening Harry Potter. In public. Draco looked on in fascination, reaching for his wand to reengage the eavesdropping spell, but before he even got his fingers on the hawthorn handle, the man hauled back his fist and released it, straight towards Potter’s rather shapely nose.
Potter ducked, and the man stumbled, losing his balance as his fist sailed through empty air. Potter fell back a step, then another, deftly sidestepping a couple dancing, his hands still raised in placation. But the bloke was fuming now, and he charged. Potter dropped, knees bent and feet spread, absorbing the blow and shovelling him back with a shoulder to his midsection. Potter twisted away, but then he disappeared, dragged to the ground and out of sight.
Draco jumped on his feet, hand at his throat, tugging aside a jumble of chains he wore until his fingers curled around a garnet amulet, refashioned from an old set of his mother’s earrings. He tapped it once with his wand, activating the magic.
“Greg, are you seeing this?”
“Yeah, I see it, boss. I’m on it,” came Greg’s voice, speaking through the matching stone Greg wore on his wrist.
Fancy bit of magic, that. He collected the spell from a cursed artefacts dealer as payment for an overdue bar tab. It took a while to get it working right, at first refusing to transmit anything but Muggle radio waves. After two weeks of nothing but BBC Radio 6, Draco had memorised the discography of some bloke named Jarvis Cocker, and could finally hear Greg’s report on the politician's son he was tossing out on his arse for drunk and disorderly behaviour. Now, it was a regular fixture, allowing them to communicate across the club with ease.
Draco tried to get a better view of the action by leaning over the railing until the sole of his shoe slipped. His stomach swooped as he regained his footing, right as the crowd pulled away from the tussling pair. Draco could see Potter now, crouched over the other bloke, pressed chest to back. Potter had his elbow looped around the man’s neck and beneath his arm, squeezing. His captive flailed, hurling himself backwards, using Potter like a great bloody cushion as they landed, hard.
Draco hissed through his teeth in sympathy, but Potter was already rolling away, scrambling to his feet with surprising nimbleness. His attacker staggered upright, throwing a sloppy punch, barely in the vicinity of Potter’s face. He dodged it with lazy ease, along with the next, the man losing steam with each failed attack.
For a moment, Draco thought the squabble might resolve itself, which was fortunate because the crowd had formed a blockade around the action, preventing Greg and the other members of Draco’s security from pushing through and stopping them. Alas, the chaos escalated when three more men stepped from the crowd and threw themselves into the fight. Draco could only assume they were the bloke’s mates because they went at Potter with everything they had. And then the girl jumped in, flinging herself around the shoulders of one of the larger men. She was a flurry of fists and shrieks, while he swung around wildly, as if trying to shake a fly. Even Potter fell back a step, surprise and alarm painted across his face in broad strokes.
Draco skirted the railing, watching as Potter ducked and dodged, only landing purposeful hits to slow the onslaught—a well-aimed elbow to the kidney, a fist to the solar plexus. And then, right as Greg and two bouncers broke through the circle, things very quickly went to hell.
The men fought Greg and his team like a herd of drunken Nogtails, shouting and scratching, making a great bloody racket. The girl turned her walloping attacks on Greg, now inexplicably defending the instigator of the whole mess. Once a member of the jeering crowd took a rogue fist to the jaw, a new group joined the scuffle.
The distraction offered Potter a golden window of opportunity, and he bolted, ducking into the crowd, ploughing towards the stairs in the opposite direction of the exit. One bloke took off after him, shoving dancers to the floor to keep him in sight. But Potter was going the wrong way. If he wasn’t careful, he’d be cornered.
Glorious inspiration struck Draco like lightning and the next second he was flying down the stairs to the main floor. The crowd farthest from the chaos remained oblivious, still drinking and dancing, though heads were beginning to turn towards the commotion. Potter emerged from the clutch of bodies, harried and stunning. Draco darted forward and snagged him by the arm.
Potter whirled, wand already in hand, but when his eyes landed on Draco, he froze.
Draco’s heart went into free-fall, landing somewhere in the vicinity of his bollocks, because Potter’s eyes were the same moss green he remembered. It had been years since he’d seen them outside of a blurry paparazzi photograph or between the pages of an old magazine.
“Hello, Potter.”
“Malfoy,” he said, voice softer than in Draco’s memories. Deeper.
“You look in need of an escape plan.”
Potter’s gaze narrowed, flicking left and right, but then he nodded, slowly.
Draco’s responding grin bordered on maniacal as he firmed his grip on Potter’s arm and dragged him up the stairs.
The staircase, though tucked towards the back of the room, lay completely exposed and from it, Draco caught sight of Potter’s pursuer. He looked furious, spinning around, searching for somewhere to bury his fist.
Draco gave his wand a flick, keeping the spell behind his teeth for safekeeping. He shivered as the chill of the conjured shadow washed over him.
Sneaky eavesdropping spells weren’t the only thing he learned during his time bartending in Knockturn Alley. A blue-eyed cat burglar Draco took home one night, taught him more than the devastating power of prostate massage. He also taught Draco a charming little spell he called Shadow Walking. An absolute bastard to master, but much like Draco’s cat burglar, Draco eventually got the hang of it. The spell and the man both falling to their knees. The burglar stole Draco’s mother’s pearls from his dresser while he slept like the dead, but Draco kept the knowledge of the spell as his prize.
It functioned a bit like an umbrella, cloaking everything that fell beneath its canopy from sight, briefly undetectable to searching eyes.
Potter’s head snapped in his direction, but Draco couldn’t waste time answering questions. He kept moving, his plan forming organically. There were four points of access for the club: the entry for all guests, an emergency exit behind the bar, and two private entries. One of them through Draco’s office, and the other through his flat on the top floor of the building.
For a crazed and desperate second, he considered leading Potter through his flat, just to see what he looked like there, amongst his possessions, but he inevitably deemed the office a more appropriate option.
He pulled Potter across the small and thankfully empty dance floor. The upstairs wasn’t always unpopulated, but it was relatively quiet for a Tuesday, and Draco wasn’t expecting the Quidditch lads until much later.
He corralled Potter towards a concealed doorway hidden behind a framed and autographed photo of Gilderoy Lockhart.
Potter shot him a sour look when Lockhart winked beguilingly from his photo.
Draco smirked. “It was my mother’s. A family heirloom.”
Potter rolled his eyes and waited as Draco dragged his wand across the wall, which rippled like silk beneath his magic.
“After you,” he said.
Potter glared at the wall. “Where does that go?”
“I have a private entryway.”
Potter refused to budge.
“What are you waiting for?”
Potter turned to him, disbelief etched across his handsome face. “Are you joking?”
Draco sighed. “I’m trying to help you.”
“Why?”
Draco tilted his head to one side, a gesture Pansy informed him made him look like a great pale bird, but he couldn’t help it because, “Why not?”
Potter looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “Seem to remember a bit of tension between us in the past.”
“Hm, true. In that case, you’re welcome to try and get out on your own. I’m not sure what that bloke wanted from you, but he looked a bit peeved.”
Potter snorted. “I guess I was dancing with his girlfriend.”
“I would hardly call what you were doing ‘dancing.’”
Potter raised one eyebrow. “You have a problem with my dancing?”
Draco grinned at him. “Worst I’ve seen in quite some time, and I’m here every night.”
“You were watching me, then?”
Draco scoffed to cover his obvious blunder. “If you want to go unnoticed, try looking less like a drunken centaur. Now, would you like to get out of here, arse unkicked? Or shall we grab a drink and have a proper chat until that angry man finds you and tries to knock your teeth in again?”
Potter’s exhale gusted out of him, weighted with annoyance, but without further hesitation, he stepped through the barrier. Draco followed, his small, well-appointed office materialising around them.
The charms on the walls dampened the roar of the club, plunging them into a ringing silence. Draco tried not to shift or telegraph his unease, suddenly all too aware of how surreal it was to stand here with Potter, alone.
Potter’s gaze swept the room with discomforting efficiency before he turned to Draco, pinning him beneath that uncanny green stare. “Are you going to sell this to the papers?”
“Why would I do that?”
Potter shrugged and echoed, “Why not?”
Draco tugged the amulet from his shirt and brushed it with his wand.
“Greg,” Draco said to the stone.
“Boss,” came the breathless response.
“Status?”
“Almost under control. We separated the bloke and his girl. Spitting like cats, the lot of them, but we’ll give them the boot. Potter’s location is unknown.”
Draco smirked at Potter. “Keep this contained, then lock it down. I don’t want even a whisper getting out.”
“Gonna cost,” Greg muttered.
“Fine. Anyone who won’t cooperate, tell them to come speak with me personally and we’ll come to an agreement.”
He hoped and prayed to whatever benevolent deity might be listening that the number of people who could identify Potter were few. A pay-off was an annoying necessity, but he’d really hate to have to Obliviate the princess of Spain or the heir to the noble Sayre house. Again.
“Aye, Draco,” Greg replied.
Draco dropped the amulet to his chest, releasing the spell. “Satisfied?” he asked Potter.
“Why are you helping me?”
“I protect the privacy of my customers.”
Potter appeared unconvinced, but he didn’t press. Draco stepped up to a sparsely filled bookshelf, running his hand over a seam in the wood. The shelf slid aside to reveal a brass panel with a single button. Draco waved his wand, and the blank expanse of designer wallpaper shimmered and melted away, leaving a darkened doorway with an iron gate.
“A lift?” Potter asked.
“Installed it myself,” Draco said. He also installed the one in his flat, though he didn’t share that information readily. “Modelled it after the Ministry’s. I spent a lot of time in those elevators, to and from hearings, trials, sentencings. I’m sure you remember. Oh wait, that’s right. You didn’t show up to my hearing. You must have been too busy.”
Potter’s blank expression didn’t slip a centimetre, which Draco found fascinating. The Potter in his memories always rose to the bait.
“There’s only one button,” Draco continued. “It will take you to the street a half block down. Shall I inform your friends you’ve left?”
Potter shook his head. “No, you’re alright. Ron knows where to find me.”
“I’m positively green with jealousy,” Draco said.
Potter’s expression flickered before returning to steely indifference. Draco pressed the button for the lift and the doors slid open.
“Your next drink is on me. For your trouble.” Draco shot him his most magnanimous smile.
Potter snorted. “You think I’m coming back?”
“I hope you do.”
Potter treated him to one last inscrutable look, then stepped inside the lift with a confused little shake of his head. He pressed the button and the gate shut between them, the lift whisking him away, possibly forever.
Draco stared into the dark shaft for a few moments before he raised his wand and returned the cloaking charms to their positions. Unable to stand the silence, he swirled out of his office and back into the club. He tucked his wand away and headed for the stairs to the main floor. Maybe, if he was lucky, there would still be some fight left, a score to settle, something, anything to distract him from the rest of the dull and Potterless night.