Club Potter 1 (Patreon)

As Hermione got out of the car, she carefully tugged her trench coat, trying to cover herself even more, despite knowing it wasn’t revealing anything. 

She was still nervous as she looked at the huge stand-alone building at the edge of Vegas, trying to suppress her panic. Yet, she didn’t let her face to show any panic. 

It had something to do with the redhead that had been driving the car. “I don’t know, Hermione. Maybe we shouldn’t bother with this and just go back. I have a bad feeling about this. Nothing good could come from this place.” 

Hermione threw him an annoyed glance. She understood where he was coming from. She truly did. Unfortunately, after repeating the same fight for a week, she had precious little patience left. Her emotional problems with the upcoming challenge were making the situation even harder to handle. 

“Ron, we have talked about it. Our options are limited. Our cover identities are already getting some suspicion. We can’t get caught by Americans, muggle or magical, or it’ll be a crisis.” 

“It’s nonsense that they don’t allow us in  their country.”  

“With the war still going on, it makes sense, Ron. They can’t afford Death Eaters infiltrating their country. It’s merciless, but makes sense.” 

“I know … but maybe we could reach the Order, and they could send—“ he tried to say, only for her to interrupt in annoyance. 

“What, Ron, someone else from the Order, so that they could set up new cover identities, travel here, hide themselves… For what. Just for one day of the mission, because you’re feeling jealous.” 

“But, Mione, it’s a strip club. What if—“ Ron tried to say, but Hermione interrupted again. 

“Enough, Ron. I had been fighting in a war for half a decade. Don’t you think I can’t defend myself,  especially with my wand with me,” she said, patting her thigh-high leather boots comfortingly, which had been modified to conceal her wand. “And it’s not like I’m going to be a dancer. I’m going to be a waitress that’s taking the shift of a friend. Our contact assures us that a five-minute interview is all that’s needed before I could start my search. Just like how we planned.” 

“Still—“ Ron started, but Hermione gestured for him to stay silent, her nerves fraying. Despite her assurances, she was not feeling confident enough to enter a strip club, especially as an employee, and Ron’s constant needling didn’t help. 

“I don’t want to rehash it, Ron. We have been fighting about it for the last three days. I have my wand, and my necklace will allow me to send a signal in an emergency so you can apparate and save me. It’s our best chance to find Potter.” 

Ron grumbled. “If he’s alive in the first place.” 

“Ron!” Hermione gasped. “You know what Dumbledore had said before his death. He had confirmed through ancient magicks that he was alive, and Vegas is the place he spent the most time in, and every test we had done showed that he spends most of his time in that building, probably as a worker or something, undercover. Without the headmaster, we need someone to fight against Voldemort.”

Ron shook his head, which frustrated Hermione more than she wanted to admit. Usually, she had no problem debating, but spending the last three days throwing the same few arguments back and forth exhausted her. “Enough Ron, I need to go. We can’t afford to be late and ruin the mission. Unless you want to tell your family how you ruined our biggest opportunity due to jealousy.” Ron still grumbled. “Come on, Ron. It doesn’t matter if it’s a strip club. You have already seen the waitress uniform. The skirt is long enough to reach my knees, and the blouse barely has a cleavage. The owner clearly doesn’t want the dancers and waitresses mixed.” 

“I guess so,” he mumbled. “Still, you’re my fiancee, and I don’t like them seeing you.” 

“I understand, but I can’t be late,” Hermione said before she leaned forward for a quick peck, but Ron turned his head. Pouting as always, Hermione realized with a frown. “As you wish,” she growled in annoyance and grabbed the small bag she prepared, and stepped out of the car.

“I’m sorry,” Ron gasped after she took a few steps. Hermione turned back, her annoyance bubbling to the surface. “No, Ron, stay in the car. You can’t leave the car. Windows are charmed to hide you, but the cameras might catch you if you leave the car,” she reminded him. 

Despite already warning him a dozen times about that already. Sometimes, her fiancee could be really impulsive. 

She started walking away, the heels of her boots clicking deafeningly. Despite her arguments, she was nowhere near comfortable with the mission, and her mode was hardly better — an unfortunate side effect of spending five years after graduation fighting an underground war, trying to keep Hogwarts safe, rather than building a career in magical experimentation. 

A discount spy wasn’t the career she envisioned. 

However, as she got closer, she started to lose her apprehension, replaced by more immediate concerns. 

Particularly, the uniform she had to wear. 

The uniform she had shown to Ron back in the motel they were using as a hideout was nothing problematic. Unfortunately, that was not uniform for the job, but the excuse Hermione came up with was to convince Ron. She didn’t like the necessity to lie to her fiancee, but the mission was too important. Ron had a streak of insecurity a mile deep, and if he knew the real uniform, there was no way he could stay in the car without ruining the mission. 

The real uniform was waiting for her in the club — and also in her mind, as she had seen some examples of what they were wearing on the internet. 

Luckily, Ron had no idea how to use a computer. 

Otherwise, he would have never allowed it. Unless she started to cast Imperius, which was certainly out of question. Not just because it wasn’t ethical, but also because casting any kind of spell was much harder in America, with their own version of trace, but targeting every single spell and not just underage spells. 

Hermione always found it ironic that a country that was so lax with its gun laws had such strict magical laws. 

Maybe it was to compensate for it. She let her mind drift toward the contrast and its political implications — aware that it was just something to distract her from the upcoming humiliation.

A part of her hesitation about the amount of skin she was about to reveal. She was a bit of a prude even by the standards of the magical world, and even her fiancee didn’t see much more than a slightly mussed uniform revealed, the most intimate they had been his wandering hands under her shirt.

Though, at the age of twenty-two, she was ready to admit that, a small part — okay, not so small part — of that hesitation came from her lack of confidence in her own body. With her mess of bushy hair and her limited knowledge of makeup, she was hardly the sexiest witch in her class… She had never been the girl who had heads turn as she walked — well, unless she was patrolling as a prefect and raining detentions.  

Admittedly, her limited wardrobe, which could be defined by the words beige and gray, hardly helped. She didn’t know who to blame for her horrible wardrobe, her own hangups, or her jealous fiancee. 

Either way, she was not prepared to find herself in a room filled with a plethora of women in various states of undress, each more beautiful than the last. Hermione knew they would be extremely beautiful, considering the place was the most expensive strip club in Vegas, opened just half a year ago, requiring a thousand dollars just to enter the place, named Marauder’s Den. 

An aggressive name, one that implied a much lower class, which would have normally caused the club to collapse — or so Hermione assumed, she was hardly an expert. 

The name, for some reason, sounded familiar, but Ron wasn’t able to pin that down either. Unfortunately, communicating secretly between continents was difficult to do in secret, so they couldn’t just ask the order about that. 

Maybe it was just her hesitancy forcing her to make a connection that wasn’t there. 

“Merlin, I wasn’t that nervous when I was fighting against Death Eaters one against four,” she murmured. Then, she shook her head, continuing to walk, doing her best not to stew on her latest argument with her fiancee, and what was about to come… 

As she approached the door at the side of the building, which was clearly marked as staff, she almost turned and left. The reason, two men that was standing at the entrance. They were tall and muscular — and admittedly, classically handsome — but their physical appearance wasn’t the thing Hermione cared about. 

No, it was their stance, which, to an inexperienced eye, looked loose and lazy, but Hermione had been in too many fights not to recognize the signs of alertness. Even before she got close, their attention was already on her, tracking her approach. 

Maybe she should have listened to Ron, she decided, but her feet ignored it, and walked steadily. 

To save their country, she needed to find Harry Potter.