The library was quiet, but not in the way he needed it to be.

Light filtered through stained glass, bending across your cheek like something sacred, and Draco could barely focus on the ink bleeding across the page. Amortentia, he was meant to be explaining. Irony, that. A love potion, when he could hardly breathe properly with you this close. His throat was dry. He lifted his quill, only to find he’d been gripping it too tightly—his fingers stiff and ink-smudged.

You leaned in to peer at the open text, your hair brushing his sleeve, and he swore the damn world tilted. He could feel it. The slow unraveling.

He cleared his throat, sharper than intended. Control yourself.

“You’ve written the wrong ratio,” he said, tone clipped. Detached. Cold, perhaps—on purpose. He couldn’t afford softness. Not with you. Not when the hem of your skirt kissed your knee like that, and your lips looked like they’d tasted laughter moments before that Draco wanted to taste, too.

You tilted your head at him. “Where?”

He gestured vaguely at your parchment, but he hadn’t even read it. He couldn’t. His eyes wouldn’t stay where they were supposed to. You had always been pretty, but this… this was something worse. You’d grown up. And he’d been watching—quietly, miserably, reverently.

He remembered the first time he saw you—second year, too sharp in the collar of his uniform, still trying to impress Lucius from a distance. Theodore had brought you over with a protective hand on your shoulder, all wide eyes and scuffed shoes, and Draco had smiled in that way he did when something threw him off-balance.

He’d never told anyone that moment branded him.

You sat back in your chair, unaware of the slow undoing happening just inches beside you. Your fingers drummed absently along the table, and Draco caught himself imagining what it would be like to hold your wrist, to bring your hand to his mouth, to ask you not to look at anyone else like that ever again.

She’s Theo’s little sister, he reminded himself. Off-limits. Untouchable.

But Merlin, he wanted to touch.

He stared at you. Just for a moment. Just to memorize. The soft curve of your mouth. The way your lashes caught the light. How the library smelled like dust and parchment and—now, somehow—vanilla and smoke. His Amortentia. Of course.

His hand twitched again. Don’t.

“Stir counter-clockwise,” he murmured, almost forgetting what he was correcting. “Three times. Not two.”

You nodded, murmured something he didn’t hear. He wasn’t listening. He was watching the curve of your neck as you leaned forward, and wondering what hell he’d fallen into—what cruel, perfect hell where he was your protector, your tutor, your… brother’s best friend.

And never the boy who could have you.