Iron Man - Employer/Employee Relations (Tony/Pepper, PG-13)
This was going to be a completely different story until I came across this photo. Among other things the man is wearing a Run D.M.C. shirt. He should just do me now.
Iron Man
Tony/Pepper (yeah, yeah, shut up)
Rated PG-13
Improv: plastic, red, sharp, postcard, jangle, daisies
Employer/Employee Relations
"I think you could be a bit more gentle with the pull-out, Potts."
"Stop being such a baby, Mr. Stark."
"Seriously, are you always this rough? Because, if you are, I think you might be in the wrong line of business."
Tony's implication is as transparent as his intentions; Pepper will just ignore it.
"If you can't take it, call somebody else," she says, working at a particularly stubborn bit of wire embedded under Tony's skin. Stupid Iron Man.
At no time in Pepper Potts' life did she want to be a make-up artist. She also didn't want to be a plastic surgeon, a den mother, a last resort or as handy as she's become with a pair of tweezers.
"I'm not being a baby -- but a little tenderness -- ouch! Do I even have any injuries there?"
"Yes -- but I can give you some more if you want."
"No, I just -- OW! I didn't peg you for the sadistic type when I hired you."
"It's something I've cultivated under your tutelage."
"That's kinky, Potts. Really. Are you trying to get me excited?"
Pepper almost pauses in her extraction of various wires from Tony's lower back to consider this question. Tony's not serious, but Pepper Potts is a reasonably sane, reasonably sensible, red-blooded American woman. She's young and not hard on the eyes, and damnit, Pepper has needs.
Unfortunately she also works damn hard every fricking day of her life for an ungrateful man who doesn't understand the first thing about her needs.
Okay, technically, Tony's not totally ungrateful, but his attention span is so short that he might as well be.
It's not enough that Pepper is all these things, and that Tony is all that he is -- please, don't get her started -- it's that Tony is, well, Tony's hot.
It pains her to say it, because Pepper isn't stupid, and she really does like her job and all the perks that come with it, but it's not like she's dead.
"Tony, do you really want to piss me off when I've got a sharp object in my hand? Really?"
"I dunno, I'm sort of helpless in this position. It would be an excellent time to take advantage of me."
The position in question is the one where Tony's bent over the back of the sofa and Pepper's kneeling beside him, pulling said wires out of said lower back area. It's not low enough to be his ass, but it's low enough that Pepper can define muscles she didn't think existed in the human body.
Leave it to Tony to teach her something new. Again.
This is not about Pepper being a Iron Man groupie -- as if -- or wanting some of the Stark billions -- she's already got her shares vested, thank you very much -- it's just that Tony is smart. And he dresses up in this shiny red suit like he's invincible when he's not, and it scares her. It's also damn hot.
She hates that he's reduced her to this.
"You want me to take advantage of you? Not on your best day, Mr. Stark." The more crisp she is, the less likely he is to think she's actually considering this. Which she's not. Not even a little bit.
"Aw, Miss Potts you wound me -- ow!" Pepper's tweezers are very sharp.
"If you keep sending Happy to fetch me in the middle of the night, so I can come out here and pull wires out of your ass, I'm really going to give you something to bitch about," Pepper says, extracting the last wire.
"Are you saying this isn't in your job description?"
"Do you really want me to pull out my job description -- because we can have that conversation if you want."
"Okay, so you're a little tired. I can understand how that might be the case."
"I'm still in my pyjamas, Tony!"
"And what lovely, yellow, flannel daisies -- Jesus fucking Christ, Pepper!" Tony bitches as she disinfects his abrasions and then slaps on a large bandage.
"You need to man up," Pepper teases.
"It's not like you're going to kiss it better." Tony tosses a sullen look over his shoulder, and Pepper is so tempted to smack him on the ass she has to get up off of the sofa.
Somebody's got to have some restraint around here, and she knows it won't be Tony.
Pepper's supposed to be getting Tony ready for yet another slicked-up, assed-out, premiere for whatever -- his words, not hers -- and the sooner she gets him out the door the sooner she can go join her friends for a drink in Venice.
It would be really nice if Pepper could socialize with people besides Tony, Rhodey and Happy for a change.
Oh, who is she kidding? It's eleven o'clock and Tony's been getting ready for almost two hours. It's going to take another hour before he leaves, and by the time she gets out of Malibu all the bars will be closed. Some days she doesn't even know why she bothers; it's not like Tony doesn't have fifty different kinds of beer and liquor anyway.
"Jarvis, tell me the honest truth, is he even close to being ready?"
"Would you like to see for yourself, Miss Potts?" Jarvis inquires as Pepper rummages through the wet bar for something that won't put hair on her chest.
Pepper ponders this for two seconds as she pours a large vodka tonic, adds two ice cubes and kicks off her heels. "No, I don't think I do," she says, picking up the Los Angeles Times and blindly flipping through it.
There's truly no end to the possibilities of what she might see, and Pepper's still too sober for most of it.
"Would you at least like me to see how long Mr. Stark will be?" Jarvis asks.
"No, that'll just make him think I want him to hurry, and then he'll take twice as long just to piss me off."
"Of course, Miss Potts." If A.I.'s could be amused, Pepper's pretty sure Jarvis would be chuckling.
Pepper has no idea what Tony does that it takes him so long to get ready. She really doesn't. Men don't have to contend with shaving their legs or applying make-up or dealing with pantyhose or if their ass looks big in a dress or if their cleavage is non-existent or that PMS has made everything too tight.
Tony's like one of those pampered dogs that get carried everywhere by their over-tanned, underfed, peroxide-on-heels starlets that are always screwing up traffic through Beverly Hills with their paparazzi trails -- he doesn't have to do anything, he just has to show up and look good.
Pepper takes another long sip of her drink and winds up coughing most of it on the Wedding Announcements page.
Apparently her ex-boyfriend from college is getting married, because her life just isn't fabulous enough.
Dan Aaronson had blue eyes and a crooked nose and an IQ over 150. He was gorgeous, smart and head of his fraternity. He even sent Pepper postcards from his junior summer in Italy, which she might still have somewhere. Dan totally adored her, and Pepper dumped him because she got bored.
Hey, it happens.
And now Dan is getting married, and Pepper's standing in her employer's kitchen wondering if she's going to have to take out the trash in another six hours.
Tony's not boring, though, she'll give him that. Tony is brilliant; he makes Dan look mentally deficient. Tony builds things, great amazing things like Jarvis and Jericho and the Iron Man suit, and when Tony's in his workshop, sweating and swearing and covered in grime from whatever he's been inventing, it makes Pepper hot.
She won't even start on the stubble.
It's so sad to say it, but Tony's brain is totally Pepper's favorite body part. There's something about watching Tony work his 3D graphic interface that makes Pepper's brain cells just sort of puddle inside her skull.
She's getting away from the point.
The point is that most days Pepper doesn't regret Dan or Steve or Adam or Brian or any of the guys who have been flung under the bus that is her job --
Of course, most days Pepper is thankful that Tony's enormous brain is dwarfed by the size of his ego or she would be in real trouble.
"Hey, Pepper, am I out of condoms?"
Pepper carefully sets her glass down on the counter so that she doesn't throw it at Tony's head. It will only be her own fault if she misses drinks because she has to spend the evening extracting shards of glass from Tony's skull.
"What did you just say to me?" Pepper enunciates every word slowly in case Tony wants to take the time to run for cover.
"I asked if I was out of condoms, I couldn't find any upstairs."
"And why do you think I would know?" Pepper's voice is taking a decidedly shrill approach to this line of questioning. "Do I look like a CVS?"
Tony pauses in checking the cuffs of his suit to look up. Whatever he sees on Pepper's face makes him take a step back. "Good point."
"I think Happy takes care of those little things," she says pointedly.
Tony's lower lip juts out. "Hey, they're not that small. Stop reading TMZ."
Pepper takes a deep breath. She loves her job. She loves her job. "Do you have your keys?"
Tony taps one of his pockets, which jangles in answer.
"Do you have your cell phone?"
"Check."
"Do you have mace to fight off the blood-sucking, gold-diggers?"
Tony smirks. "Now why would I want to do that?"
Pepper rolls her eyes. "Do you have money for a taxi for when you're too drunk to drive or figure out the speed dial to call Happy?"
Tony grins. "Yes, Miss Potts."
"Okay," Pepper concedes, grabbing the paper and her drink and heading for the sofa. Maybe she can catch the last of The Daily Show. There's no point in driving to Venice now that she's started drinking here. "Go away before I waste good liquor by throwing it at you."
Tony nods and Pepper busies herself looking for the remote. It takes her a moment to realize Tony hasn't left the room. "Did you forget something?" she asks, standing up and looking around expectantly as he approaches her.
"Don't stay up too late watching porn," he warns before kissing her quickly on the cheek and dashing for the stairs.
"I hate you sometimes," Pepper calls automatically.
Tony pauses on the top stair to the workshop and garage. "I know you do," he says brightly. And then he's gone.
Typical Tony -- make a mess and then leave her to figure it out.
That one time when Tony went missing in Afghanistan and everybody thought he was dead, Pepper almost lost her mind. No, really. She sort of did. She lost eight pounds in the first three weeks and forgot how to get dressed for two whole days.
And then Tony came back, and she cried like an idiot, but she was so happy to see him she didn't even care when he teased her. She didn't even mind when he put them all out of a job or ate six cheeseburgers from In-and-Out and she had to go get him a bottle of Pepto Bismol at three in the morning.
She thinks about that when she's supposed to bury her hand in the hole in Tony's chest, and she's trying not to freak the hell out.
This doesn't even fit under the 'miscellaneous tasks' chart that she keeps in Excel just in case he ever tries to shortchange her on a raise. Not that that's ever likely to happen. Pepper's had more pay increases in the last six months than she's had in the last two years combined.
"I thought we just did this last week?" Pepper takes off the silver bracelet she bought at the Fairfax Flea Market last week and drops it in her pocket. She's not stalling, but Tony's hooked up to way too many wires. It makes her anxious.
"Yes, but now it's this week." Tony smiles beatifically as she walks to his side. "New week, new shit."
Pepper wrinkles her nose and pushes up her sleeves. "I thought you said I wouldn't have to do this anymore."
"I thought you liked having proof that I've got a heart," he says, taking her hand and gently directing it inside his chest.
Oh god, if she didn't really really like Tony, she'd totally quit. "There's proof and then there's goop," she says with a wince.
"Goop. I like it. Not really scientific, though," he says, leaning forward and into her hand. "A little to the right."
Pepper's angle is all wrong and she has to lean into him too. He's been working too hard. He's sweaty and smelly, and she hates it when he breathes on her. It's distracting. She's practically got her chest in his face. Maybe he won't notice the way her nose is almost buried in his hair.
She is not shaking. It's just nerves.
"Potts, I have to say I'm really digging the freckles. Are they everywhere?"
Pepper makes her obligatory sound of disgust. "You're an asshole," she says, trying to find the problem he called her about and not kill him then and there.
"I love it when you talk dirty to me."
Between the goop and the stuff she doesn't want to think about, Pepper finally gets the wire he's been bitching about. "I will totally zap your ass," she warns.
"Ooooh, Potts. Say some more. Say some - OW!"
"Behave yourself, Mr. Stark." Pepper says, slowly extracting her hand so Tony can see the wire. "I know your Achilles heel."
Tony just smiles ruefully and makes her hold the generator while he inserts the errant wire back where it belongs. "If I were Greek like Achilles, I'd be naked now," he says, helping her slide the arc back into place.
"Please don't get any ideas," Pepper says, making sure the generator locks in.
"Aw, Potts," Tony's grin is huge as he covers her hands with his own. He's so warm it's sinful. "You're no fun."
It takes Pepper a moment to remember to remove her hand from his chest after he lets go.
Stupid, confusing man.
Tony Stark the industrialist is impressive. He's got shiny cars, a big brain and a huge house. Iron Man the superhero is everybody's dream. He can fly and save kittens from trees and solve conflicts with a single blast. They're nice and flashy personas, but Pepper doesn't really want nice and flashy. The guy she wants is the one who sprawls out next to her on the sofa in a tee shirt and sweatpants, eats Chinese food from the carton and calls the people on Jeopardy dumbasses.
"How the hell can you not know that the largest island in the world is Greenland?" Tony howls at the TV. "Australia is a fucking continent, you moron!"
Pepper pokes through her beef and broccoli. She doesn't really like the beef; she gets it for the broccoli. Tony'll eat the beef part. He hates vegetables. "You do know they can't hear you, right?"
"Why is the world made of so many stupid people, Potts?"
Tony actually seems offended, which is sort of cute. If Tony Stark could be considered cute.
"You act like it's a personal affront, Tony." She can't help mocking him. She also can help noticing that, for the first time in four weeks, he's in on a weeknight instead of running all over L.A. County doing god and Rhodey only knows what.
Tony slumps further down on the sofa. "You're not stupid, Potts."
"Thanks," she says dryly.
"No, I mean it. Why can't everybody be like you?" Tony's curled on his side, staring up at her with those huge eyes. Damn him. He must want something.
"If everybody was like me, you wouldn't have any vapid starlets to take home, now would you?"
"This is true."
"I know it is," Pepper says, deftly skewering another piece of broccoli.
Pepper knows the sorts of women Tony likes: blond, brainless, buxom and tanned to within an inch of their plastic lives. Silicone optional. Tony doesn't like real women -- well, he does, he just doesn't date them.
"But still," Tony carries on, "girls like you don't date guys like me. I know. I've tried."
Pepper makes a snorting noise. "Oh really? You tried with who? Miss Maxim or Miss FHM? Maybe it was with Miss Penthouse."
"Point taken."
"You don't date, Tony," Pepper clarifies. "You have one-night stands."
"To be fair, some of those stands don't really last the whole night," Tony says, pushing himself up and over into Pepper's personal space. She uses the carton of beef and broccoli to keep some semblance of distance between them.
"Beef?" she says, using her forearm to keep him back.
Tony's chopsticks click together as he grapples for a piece and pops it his mouth. He chews silently, but Pepper can feel his eyes on her face like fingers ghosting over her cheekbones. Jeopardy has never been this interesting.
Tony's angling for something, but Pepper's not stupid and only stupid people sleep with their bosses and lose their monthly stipend for miscellaneous expenses. She knows that her relationship with Tony works because they know their place. He flirts, she rolls her eyes. She stares sometimes, he pretends not to notice. Okay, he notices but he always gives her an out from the innuendos and whatever else.
Tony leans back against the sofa, his sprawled out leg pressing against her thigh. Pepper thinks about poking him with her chopstick.
"Do you think I could have a real relationship, Potts?" Pepper just snorts and decides poking Tony's a good idea. He dutifully moves his thigh. "That would be a dissenting opinion, I take it."
"You can do anything you put your mind to, Mr. Stark," Pepper says vaguely, leaning back against the sofa herself. Her back is feeling a bit stiff and slouching suddenly seems very appealing.
"I can do anything as long as I've got you," Tony says lightly, grabbing Pepper's wrist and holding the beef and broccoli where he can get at it.
When Pepper turns her head, Tony's watching her intently. They're entirely too close for good employer/employee relations. "I guess it's a good thing I'm not going anywhere then, isn't it?"
Tony's smile is broad and blinding. "I knew you didn't hate me that much."
She shrugs in assent, because, of course, it's true.
Pepper hates Tony's huge brown eyes and his twisted smirking mouth. She hates the stubble that artfully dots his jaw, and the lines that prominently cross his brow when he's been up for 48 hours straight creating whatever brilliant thing he's creating at the time.
Pepper hates the way Tony is arrogant and brash and brilliant and callous -- she could use every letter in the alphabet, right down to zealous -- but mostly she hates the way that he makes her fall in love with him a little more every day.
"You are so full of it," Pepper says mildly as Tony sort of melts into her side.
"Yeah, but at least I have you."
Pepper stiffens for a moment and then she just relaxes, because what else can she do?
Nothing about Tony has ever been rational and nothing about their relationship has ever been healthy. They were always headed in this direction.
Maybe she'll write a book called, How to Fall in Love With Your Superhero Boss and Live With It by Pepper Potts.
-end-
Iron Man
Tony/Pepper (yeah, yeah, shut up)
Rated PG-13
Improv: plastic, red, sharp, postcard, jangle, daisies
Employer/Employee Relations
"I think you could be a bit more gentle with the pull-out, Potts."
"Stop being such a baby, Mr. Stark."
"Seriously, are you always this rough? Because, if you are, I think you might be in the wrong line of business."
Tony's implication is as transparent as his intentions; Pepper will just ignore it.
"If you can't take it, call somebody else," she says, working at a particularly stubborn bit of wire embedded under Tony's skin. Stupid Iron Man.
At no time in Pepper Potts' life did she want to be a make-up artist. She also didn't want to be a plastic surgeon, a den mother, a last resort or as handy as she's become with a pair of tweezers.
"I'm not being a baby -- but a little tenderness -- ouch! Do I even have any injuries there?"
"Yes -- but I can give you some more if you want."
"No, I just -- OW! I didn't peg you for the sadistic type when I hired you."
"It's something I've cultivated under your tutelage."
"That's kinky, Potts. Really. Are you trying to get me excited?"
Pepper almost pauses in her extraction of various wires from Tony's lower back to consider this question. Tony's not serious, but Pepper Potts is a reasonably sane, reasonably sensible, red-blooded American woman. She's young and not hard on the eyes, and damnit, Pepper has needs.
Unfortunately she also works damn hard every fricking day of her life for an ungrateful man who doesn't understand the first thing about her needs.
Okay, technically, Tony's not totally ungrateful, but his attention span is so short that he might as well be.
It's not enough that Pepper is all these things, and that Tony is all that he is -- please, don't get her started -- it's that Tony is, well, Tony's hot.
It pains her to say it, because Pepper isn't stupid, and she really does like her job and all the perks that come with it, but it's not like she's dead.
"Tony, do you really want to piss me off when I've got a sharp object in my hand? Really?"
"I dunno, I'm sort of helpless in this position. It would be an excellent time to take advantage of me."
The position in question is the one where Tony's bent over the back of the sofa and Pepper's kneeling beside him, pulling said wires out of said lower back area. It's not low enough to be his ass, but it's low enough that Pepper can define muscles she didn't think existed in the human body.
Leave it to Tony to teach her something new. Again.
This is not about Pepper being a Iron Man groupie -- as if -- or wanting some of the Stark billions -- she's already got her shares vested, thank you very much -- it's just that Tony is smart. And he dresses up in this shiny red suit like he's invincible when he's not, and it scares her. It's also damn hot.
She hates that he's reduced her to this.
"You want me to take advantage of you? Not on your best day, Mr. Stark." The more crisp she is, the less likely he is to think she's actually considering this. Which she's not. Not even a little bit.
"Aw, Miss Potts you wound me -- ow!" Pepper's tweezers are very sharp.
"If you keep sending Happy to fetch me in the middle of the night, so I can come out here and pull wires out of your ass, I'm really going to give you something to bitch about," Pepper says, extracting the last wire.
"Are you saying this isn't in your job description?"
"Do you really want me to pull out my job description -- because we can have that conversation if you want."
"Okay, so you're a little tired. I can understand how that might be the case."
"I'm still in my pyjamas, Tony!"
"And what lovely, yellow, flannel daisies -- Jesus fucking Christ, Pepper!" Tony bitches as she disinfects his abrasions and then slaps on a large bandage.
"You need to man up," Pepper teases.
"It's not like you're going to kiss it better." Tony tosses a sullen look over his shoulder, and Pepper is so tempted to smack him on the ass she has to get up off of the sofa.
Somebody's got to have some restraint around here, and she knows it won't be Tony.
Pepper's supposed to be getting Tony ready for yet another slicked-up, assed-out, premiere for whatever -- his words, not hers -- and the sooner she gets him out the door the sooner she can go join her friends for a drink in Venice.
It would be really nice if Pepper could socialize with people besides Tony, Rhodey and Happy for a change.
Oh, who is she kidding? It's eleven o'clock and Tony's been getting ready for almost two hours. It's going to take another hour before he leaves, and by the time she gets out of Malibu all the bars will be closed. Some days she doesn't even know why she bothers; it's not like Tony doesn't have fifty different kinds of beer and liquor anyway.
"Jarvis, tell me the honest truth, is he even close to being ready?"
"Would you like to see for yourself, Miss Potts?" Jarvis inquires as Pepper rummages through the wet bar for something that won't put hair on her chest.
Pepper ponders this for two seconds as she pours a large vodka tonic, adds two ice cubes and kicks off her heels. "No, I don't think I do," she says, picking up the Los Angeles Times and blindly flipping through it.
There's truly no end to the possibilities of what she might see, and Pepper's still too sober for most of it.
"Would you at least like me to see how long Mr. Stark will be?" Jarvis asks.
"No, that'll just make him think I want him to hurry, and then he'll take twice as long just to piss me off."
"Of course, Miss Potts." If A.I.'s could be amused, Pepper's pretty sure Jarvis would be chuckling.
Pepper has no idea what Tony does that it takes him so long to get ready. She really doesn't. Men don't have to contend with shaving their legs or applying make-up or dealing with pantyhose or if their ass looks big in a dress or if their cleavage is non-existent or that PMS has made everything too tight.
Tony's like one of those pampered dogs that get carried everywhere by their over-tanned, underfed, peroxide-on-heels starlets that are always screwing up traffic through Beverly Hills with their paparazzi trails -- he doesn't have to do anything, he just has to show up and look good.
Pepper takes another long sip of her drink and winds up coughing most of it on the Wedding Announcements page.
Apparently her ex-boyfriend from college is getting married, because her life just isn't fabulous enough.
Dan Aaronson had blue eyes and a crooked nose and an IQ over 150. He was gorgeous, smart and head of his fraternity. He even sent Pepper postcards from his junior summer in Italy, which she might still have somewhere. Dan totally adored her, and Pepper dumped him because she got bored.
Hey, it happens.
And now Dan is getting married, and Pepper's standing in her employer's kitchen wondering if she's going to have to take out the trash in another six hours.
Tony's not boring, though, she'll give him that. Tony is brilliant; he makes Dan look mentally deficient. Tony builds things, great amazing things like Jarvis and Jericho and the Iron Man suit, and when Tony's in his workshop, sweating and swearing and covered in grime from whatever he's been inventing, it makes Pepper hot.
She won't even start on the stubble.
It's so sad to say it, but Tony's brain is totally Pepper's favorite body part. There's something about watching Tony work his 3D graphic interface that makes Pepper's brain cells just sort of puddle inside her skull.
She's getting away from the point.
The point is that most days Pepper doesn't regret Dan or Steve or Adam or Brian or any of the guys who have been flung under the bus that is her job --
Of course, most days Pepper is thankful that Tony's enormous brain is dwarfed by the size of his ego or she would be in real trouble.
"Hey, Pepper, am I out of condoms?"
Pepper carefully sets her glass down on the counter so that she doesn't throw it at Tony's head. It will only be her own fault if she misses drinks because she has to spend the evening extracting shards of glass from Tony's skull.
"What did you just say to me?" Pepper enunciates every word slowly in case Tony wants to take the time to run for cover.
"I asked if I was out of condoms, I couldn't find any upstairs."
"And why do you think I would know?" Pepper's voice is taking a decidedly shrill approach to this line of questioning. "Do I look like a CVS?"
Tony pauses in checking the cuffs of his suit to look up. Whatever he sees on Pepper's face makes him take a step back. "Good point."
"I think Happy takes care of those little things," she says pointedly.
Tony's lower lip juts out. "Hey, they're not that small. Stop reading TMZ."
Pepper takes a deep breath. She loves her job. She loves her job. "Do you have your keys?"
Tony taps one of his pockets, which jangles in answer.
"Do you have your cell phone?"
"Check."
"Do you have mace to fight off the blood-sucking, gold-diggers?"
Tony smirks. "Now why would I want to do that?"
Pepper rolls her eyes. "Do you have money for a taxi for when you're too drunk to drive or figure out the speed dial to call Happy?"
Tony grins. "Yes, Miss Potts."
"Okay," Pepper concedes, grabbing the paper and her drink and heading for the sofa. Maybe she can catch the last of The Daily Show. There's no point in driving to Venice now that she's started drinking here. "Go away before I waste good liquor by throwing it at you."
Tony nods and Pepper busies herself looking for the remote. It takes her a moment to realize Tony hasn't left the room. "Did you forget something?" she asks, standing up and looking around expectantly as he approaches her.
"Don't stay up too late watching porn," he warns before kissing her quickly on the cheek and dashing for the stairs.
"I hate you sometimes," Pepper calls automatically.
Tony pauses on the top stair to the workshop and garage. "I know you do," he says brightly. And then he's gone.
Typical Tony -- make a mess and then leave her to figure it out.
That one time when Tony went missing in Afghanistan and everybody thought he was dead, Pepper almost lost her mind. No, really. She sort of did. She lost eight pounds in the first three weeks and forgot how to get dressed for two whole days.
And then Tony came back, and she cried like an idiot, but she was so happy to see him she didn't even care when he teased her. She didn't even mind when he put them all out of a job or ate six cheeseburgers from In-and-Out and she had to go get him a bottle of Pepto Bismol at three in the morning.
She thinks about that when she's supposed to bury her hand in the hole in Tony's chest, and she's trying not to freak the hell out.
This doesn't even fit under the 'miscellaneous tasks' chart that she keeps in Excel just in case he ever tries to shortchange her on a raise. Not that that's ever likely to happen. Pepper's had more pay increases in the last six months than she's had in the last two years combined.
"I thought we just did this last week?" Pepper takes off the silver bracelet she bought at the Fairfax Flea Market last week and drops it in her pocket. She's not stalling, but Tony's hooked up to way too many wires. It makes her anxious.
"Yes, but now it's this week." Tony smiles beatifically as she walks to his side. "New week, new shit."
Pepper wrinkles her nose and pushes up her sleeves. "I thought you said I wouldn't have to do this anymore."
"I thought you liked having proof that I've got a heart," he says, taking her hand and gently directing it inside his chest.
Oh god, if she didn't really really like Tony, she'd totally quit. "There's proof and then there's goop," she says with a wince.
"Goop. I like it. Not really scientific, though," he says, leaning forward and into her hand. "A little to the right."
Pepper's angle is all wrong and she has to lean into him too. He's been working too hard. He's sweaty and smelly, and she hates it when he breathes on her. It's distracting. She's practically got her chest in his face. Maybe he won't notice the way her nose is almost buried in his hair.
She is not shaking. It's just nerves.
"Potts, I have to say I'm really digging the freckles. Are they everywhere?"
Pepper makes her obligatory sound of disgust. "You're an asshole," she says, trying to find the problem he called her about and not kill him then and there.
"I love it when you talk dirty to me."
Between the goop and the stuff she doesn't want to think about, Pepper finally gets the wire he's been bitching about. "I will totally zap your ass," she warns.
"Ooooh, Potts. Say some more. Say some - OW!"
"Behave yourself, Mr. Stark." Pepper says, slowly extracting her hand so Tony can see the wire. "I know your Achilles heel."
Tony just smiles ruefully and makes her hold the generator while he inserts the errant wire back where it belongs. "If I were Greek like Achilles, I'd be naked now," he says, helping her slide the arc back into place.
"Please don't get any ideas," Pepper says, making sure the generator locks in.
"Aw, Potts," Tony's grin is huge as he covers her hands with his own. He's so warm it's sinful. "You're no fun."
It takes Pepper a moment to remember to remove her hand from his chest after he lets go.
Stupid, confusing man.
Tony Stark the industrialist is impressive. He's got shiny cars, a big brain and a huge house. Iron Man the superhero is everybody's dream. He can fly and save kittens from trees and solve conflicts with a single blast. They're nice and flashy personas, but Pepper doesn't really want nice and flashy. The guy she wants is the one who sprawls out next to her on the sofa in a tee shirt and sweatpants, eats Chinese food from the carton and calls the people on Jeopardy dumbasses.
"How the hell can you not know that the largest island in the world is Greenland?" Tony howls at the TV. "Australia is a fucking continent, you moron!"
Pepper pokes through her beef and broccoli. She doesn't really like the beef; she gets it for the broccoli. Tony'll eat the beef part. He hates vegetables. "You do know they can't hear you, right?"
"Why is the world made of so many stupid people, Potts?"
Tony actually seems offended, which is sort of cute. If Tony Stark could be considered cute.
"You act like it's a personal affront, Tony." She can't help mocking him. She also can help noticing that, for the first time in four weeks, he's in on a weeknight instead of running all over L.A. County doing god and Rhodey only knows what.
Tony slumps further down on the sofa. "You're not stupid, Potts."
"Thanks," she says dryly.
"No, I mean it. Why can't everybody be like you?" Tony's curled on his side, staring up at her with those huge eyes. Damn him. He must want something.
"If everybody was like me, you wouldn't have any vapid starlets to take home, now would you?"
"This is true."
"I know it is," Pepper says, deftly skewering another piece of broccoli.
Pepper knows the sorts of women Tony likes: blond, brainless, buxom and tanned to within an inch of their plastic lives. Silicone optional. Tony doesn't like real women -- well, he does, he just doesn't date them.
"But still," Tony carries on, "girls like you don't date guys like me. I know. I've tried."
Pepper makes a snorting noise. "Oh really? You tried with who? Miss Maxim or Miss FHM? Maybe it was with Miss Penthouse."
"Point taken."
"You don't date, Tony," Pepper clarifies. "You have one-night stands."
"To be fair, some of those stands don't really last the whole night," Tony says, pushing himself up and over into Pepper's personal space. She uses the carton of beef and broccoli to keep some semblance of distance between them.
"Beef?" she says, using her forearm to keep him back.
Tony's chopsticks click together as he grapples for a piece and pops it his mouth. He chews silently, but Pepper can feel his eyes on her face like fingers ghosting over her cheekbones. Jeopardy has never been this interesting.
Tony's angling for something, but Pepper's not stupid and only stupid people sleep with their bosses and lose their monthly stipend for miscellaneous expenses. She knows that her relationship with Tony works because they know their place. He flirts, she rolls her eyes. She stares sometimes, he pretends not to notice. Okay, he notices but he always gives her an out from the innuendos and whatever else.
Tony leans back against the sofa, his sprawled out leg pressing against her thigh. Pepper thinks about poking him with her chopstick.
"Do you think I could have a real relationship, Potts?" Pepper just snorts and decides poking Tony's a good idea. He dutifully moves his thigh. "That would be a dissenting opinion, I take it."
"You can do anything you put your mind to, Mr. Stark," Pepper says vaguely, leaning back against the sofa herself. Her back is feeling a bit stiff and slouching suddenly seems very appealing.
"I can do anything as long as I've got you," Tony says lightly, grabbing Pepper's wrist and holding the beef and broccoli where he can get at it.
When Pepper turns her head, Tony's watching her intently. They're entirely too close for good employer/employee relations. "I guess it's a good thing I'm not going anywhere then, isn't it?"
Tony's smile is broad and blinding. "I knew you didn't hate me that much."
She shrugs in assent, because, of course, it's true.
Pepper hates Tony's huge brown eyes and his twisted smirking mouth. She hates the stubble that artfully dots his jaw, and the lines that prominently cross his brow when he's been up for 48 hours straight creating whatever brilliant thing he's creating at the time.
Pepper hates the way Tony is arrogant and brash and brilliant and callous -- she could use every letter in the alphabet, right down to zealous -- but mostly she hates the way that he makes her fall in love with him a little more every day.
"You are so full of it," Pepper says mildly as Tony sort of melts into her side.
"Yeah, but at least I have you."
Pepper stiffens for a moment and then she just relaxes, because what else can she do?
Nothing about Tony has ever been rational and nothing about their relationship has ever been healthy. They were always headed in this direction.
Maybe she'll write a book called, How to Fall in Love With Your Superhero Boss and Live With It by Pepper Potts.
-end-