Inheritance (A Drarry FanFiction)

Chapter Two

   A couple of weeks later saw Draco slumped down on his desk, staring morosely at his computer screen as he jealously flicked through his friends' photos on Facebook. They didn't seem to understand when he told them he'd much rather be scrimping a few quid together to make it down the union, rather than up on the thirty-sixth floor. All they could see was money and power, they didn't seem to want to hear he still had very little clue what he was supposed to be working on, and with nothing much to do, was bored out of his mind.

His only respite had come in the form of the adorable, passionate, if not slightly clueless Harry Potter, who Pansy had managed to get Draco on not one but two lunch meetings with. All Draco had to do was ask what books he had been reading, and he could watch the whirlwind that Harry became for at least a couple of hours as he rattled through his new favourite characters and writing styles, and almost-spoilers that he reigned back in at the last second because "Oh no Draco, you'll have to read it first!" Draco was sure he was supposed to be doing something productive with that time, like establishing annual departmental profit margins or assessing the overheads compared to outgoing costs, but honest to god if he didn't more or less study Harry's lips the entire time.

Movement beyond the glass of his office had Draco snapping back up to attention, just in time for Pansy to stride in and drop a bound file on his keyboard. "The board are having a meeting," she said coolly.

"When?"

Parkinson pressed her well manicured hands together and checked her watch. "In about ten minutes."

Draco's stomach dropped. "Was I invited?"

"No," said Parkinson.

"What's this then?" he asked, picking up the couple dozen sheets of ring-bound paper.

She gave him the smallest of smiles. "Everything you need to know about the meeting, in handy colour-coded bullet points."

Draco could have kissed her. "Did I ever tell you you should be running this company?" he informed her, ginning like an idiot as he hurriedly cracked open the first page and yanked several highlighters and post-it notes from his drawer.

"I think that was the first time today," she said with a wink. "But it's only 11:20."

Draco spent the next five minutes in a blur, absorbing every fact his study-starved brain could manage, cross-referencing with a few quick Google searches and several shouted questions to Pansy at her desk outside. He hadn't had anything challenging to do in ages, this was wonderful, he felt positively electrified as he grabbed his iPad and marched down to the main conference room, strolling inside just as the last of the eight department heads were getting seated.

"Good morning," he said chirpily, snagging the chair nearest to him before he could fret about established seating arrangements, and smiling pleasantly at the men and women before him. A number of them raised their eyebrows in surprise, but one or two glowered in outright hostility. Gabriel Fox, the Financial Director and oldest member in the room, was the most unimpressed of the lot, crossing his arms over his broad chest and lowering his gaze, creating so many additional chins his bowtie was in danger of being swallowed up entirely.

Draco was obviously the youngest in the room, but he wasn't going to let that derail him; he had every right to be there, and thanks to Pansy he had a solid heads up on what was on the agenda. The only other person close to his age was Harry, and while a couple other people had tablets like Draco laid out in front of them, Harry had a notebook, several lose sheets of paper, a couple of novels open at certain pages with their spines bent back, and pens in blue, black, green and red, one of them clamped between his teeth, another hastily scribbling notes. He blinked, noticing the atmosphere had shifted at Draco's entrance, before looking up to spot Draco himself. He snatched the pen from his mouth and gave him a tight smile and a nod, which Draco returned enthusiastically.