FIC: "Drive" (5/?) - Iron Man (movieverse), Tony/Pepper, R
"Drive"
Written for the Valentine's challenge at its_always_been . See master page for prompts, author's notes, and previous/subsequent chapters.
Bonus author's notes: thank you to everyone who encouraged me after the last chapter. This "sustaining a plot over several chapters" thing doesn't come naturally to me, and I appreciate your feedback.
This chapter is like, super R. Almost NC-17, but not quite, 'cause I'm a shy robot.
And yes, I borrowed the Executive Retreat from that other story I wrote where Tony and Pepper had casual sex. I don't know why the two are so inextricably linked in my mind? I guess it was just a decent plot device and I felt it deserved more play.
Also, OMFG I HAD THIS ALL CODED AND THEN LJ ATE IT. Not impressed. I have to be up at f**k o'clock tomorrow for work and I really wish the internet could do me a solid just once and let me rock out with my fic out. Damn, LJ. Damn.
5. Between Your Hips
Tony and Pepper have a Friday afternoon tradition called the Executive Retreat. At around 5:00, the CEO and CTO change into casual attire, find a relatively unpopular bar, and have a quiet drink together before going their separate ways over the weekend. It’s a chance both to decompress and to rally-neither of their jobs really stop at the closing bell.
After the way they left things on Monday, Tony isn’t sure what to expect-but at 4:45 on the nose, Pepper appears in the doorway of his office and asks when he’ll be ready to leave.
This week’s establishment is called The Lineup-which is ironic, because there certainly isn’t one. Tony jokingly calls it “Fronty’s,” because the fact that it manages to survive without any visible means of income points to its being owned by some kind of organized crime outfit. But the drinks are cheap and the atmosphere is pretty mellow, which suits their purposes just fine. Happy drops them off with a promise to be back in two hours’ time.
Tony has hardly seen Pepper all week. They’ve e-mailed every day, and they’ve participated in a couple of the same teleconferences, but their in-person contact has been limited to a couple of chance encounters in the hall-and both times, one of them was in a hurry to get somewhere, so they didn’t really talk.
It’s strange, spending so much time apart, after having her in his orbit for so long. It isn’t that Tony is averse to change-he’s what the marketing department would refer to as an early adopter-but Pepper has been one of the few constants in his life over the past decade, and without her steadying influence he feels increasingly unmoored.
She’s wearing a short-sleeved blue gingham button-down shirt, and a pair of jeans that she appears to have been lovingly stitched into. Tony’s doing his absolute level best not to ogle, but it’s been a long week, and he can’t help noticing the way her chest bounces a little as she scoots into the booth. He wasn’t intending to give her a second opportunity to shoot him down, but now he’s considering it.
Tony buys the first round. He also orders wings for them to share-largely for the pleasure of watching Pepper lick Tabasco from her fingertips, the heat flooding into her face. He teases her about the way she stows the extra wet-naps in her bag: “How much do you make a year, these days?”
She shrugs. “Force of habit.” She still doesn’t put them back.
“How was the awards night?” he asks, against his better judgement. “Did you dance?” He pictures her gliding over the dance floor in that amazing green dress, being whisked across the room by… who? Some handsome young politico looking for a photo-op? A fellow industrialist-a self-made man who admires her for her work ethic? Happy Hogan in his wrinkled monkey suit?
“No. I ended up getting cornered by Senator Stern, of all people. He decided that I really needed to hear his opinion about carbon offsets.”
“Which was?”
“I’m not sure.” Pepper grimaces. “I was tired, and he was drunk, and after a while I just stopped paying attention.”
“Be careful, Potts. That is how unplanned pregnancies happen.”
“Maybe to you,” she retorts.
Pepper buys the second round, and they lapse into a companionable silence, each lost in their own thoughts-until Pepper’s Blackberry suddenly starts juddering across the table. She gives it a surreptitious glance before tucking it into her pocket.
“Don’t mind me, boss,” says Tony, cheekily, two ounces of liquid courage burning in his chest. There is no work allowed at the Executive Retreat. In fact, it has many of the same rules as their other arrangement. Tony wonders whether the rest of Pepper’s social life is as strictly regulated.
She makes a face. “Don’t worry, I don’t.”
“That’s a pretty powerful vibrate setting.”
There’s a certain tension in her shoulders that he’s seen before, when she’s been exasperated with his come-ons. He figures she’s going to smack him in a minute.
“It has its uses,” she says, her voice low and slightly ragged. Her small fingers sweep her bangs sideways, out of her eyes; she seems transfixed by his hands, which are resting lightly on the table. He’s pleased-Tony’s never been particularly modest about his dark good looks, but his hands have always been one of his secret vanities.
“I’d love to hear about them.”
“I’m sure you would.” Her gaze flicks up to his face. She takes a sip of her gin and tonic, her mouth pursing around the straw in a way that makes him have to shift in his seat.
He knows it’s dangerous, but he wants to see just how far he can push this particular line of inquiry. “Do you own any of that kind of hardware, Pepper?”
She’s silent for so long that he doesn’t think she’s going to answer. He’s already half-formed the next thing he’s going to say when she replies, “I did, but it met with a tragic demise.” She licks her lips slowly, deliberately. She’s slightly tipsy-enough to use terms like ‘tragic demise’-but not so drunk that she’s unaware of the effect she’s having on him.
“Potts, you sly minx. You wore it out?”
“Not exactly…”
“Fried the motor?”
“No, I-”
“Snapped it with the sheer strength of your-”
“Stop guessing or I’m not telling you,” she interjects.
He nods, and gestures for her to continue.
“I dropped it in the shower. The plastic cracked, and the inside got wet. I tried to air everything out, but now it makes a weird noise, and I’m afraid to use it for fear of electrocuting myself.”
He has to smile, because it’s so entirely Pepper: her compulsive thriftiness, her stubborn refusal to let go of her outdated tech-whether it’s last year’s smartphone or a waterlogged vibrator.
“I should just throw it away,” she adds, more to herself than to him.
“Wrong.” His mouth is talking, functioning independently of his brain-which is busy building a set piece for future fantasies, involving gleaming white tile and warm water trickling over fair, freckled skin. “You should let me fix it for you. Better still-I’ll build you a new one. Waterproof. Shatterproof. Soundless. With a long-life battery.”
Pepper gives him a devilish smile. “Then what would I need you for?”
Tony’s blood is thundering in his ears, desire slamming into him like a sucker punch. He counters with, “Come over tonight and I’ll show you my long-life battery.”
“No thanks,” she says briskly.
“If you’re hungry, we can get dinner first. As long as it’s not someplace with a dress code.” He indicates his own jeans and t-shirt.
“It’s not that. I just don’t relish the thought of being spotted leaving your house in the middle of the night with my shirt on inside out.”
“Just a shot in the dark here, but: don’t put your shirt on inside out?”
“I’m speaking rhetorically, Tony.”
“Okay, but… let me get this straight.” He leans forward, puts both elbows on the table, and steeples his fingers to keep his hands from fidgeting. “You’re not objecting to the proposed activity-just the potential damage to your professional reputation?”
“Correct.” Her gaze is still fixed on his hands.
“Well, rhetorically speaking, did you know that the bathrooms here are singles with locks on the doors?”
She looks perplexed for a moment, and then her colour swiftly rises, flourishing across her skin in crimson bursts, like fireworks. “I did not know that.”
“Well, don’t just take my word for it.” He grins. “We should go and collect some empirical evidence.”
“Tell you what. Why don’t you go to the men’s room and do a preliminary study, and then I’ll come along in about,” she glances at her wrist watch, “three minutes to check your results?”
Her smile is like a shot of current straight to his solar plexus. He can’t quite believe she’s actually going to go along with this. “Three minutes is a long time.”
She nods slowly. “Use it wisely.”
*
He knows what that means, or thinks he does, but Tony spends most of his three minutes pacing the length of the small room repeatedly, shoes squeaking over the linoleum. He’s in high gear, every muscle tense, his entire body coiled to spring. He ticks off the seconds in his head, wondering if she’s taken the opportunity to slip out and hail a cab.
Pepper knocks softly before pushing the door open, glancing over her shoulder as she does so. He grabs her arm at the elbow and pulls her the rest of the way inside. The moment she’s in, he shoves the door closed and locks it, herding her towards the wall until her shoulders are squared against the tile. Her eyes, hard and blazing as sapphires, never leave his face as he works his way down the front of her shirt, flicking it open button by button.
It’s the first time he’s undressed her under such a bright light-the first time he’s been able to fully appreciate the light dusting of freckles over her neck and shoulders, her decolletage. Pepper’s freckles have always been an emotional barometer: he can tell if she’s been working too hard, spending too much time indoors, by how much they’ve faded. He remembers how dark they were that day on the tarmac at Edwards, as though they’d been waiting three months for his return to make their appearance.
After dispatching the buttons, his hand skims down to the fly of her jeans. They’re fitted and faded, the denim soft and feathery, the low rise exposing her sleek abdominals, the divot of her navel. He dips his fingers lower, the heat of her radiating through the fabric.
“Mm,” she says, and surges into him, trapping his hand between them. She kisses him hard and hungrily, her open mouth grinding against his. He nibbles her lower lip; she tastes like wintergreen and juniper and he just wants to devour her whole.
Which, he reflects, is probably exactly what she needs after such a long week.
He kisses a trail down to her midriff, lowering himself until his knees are pressed to the cold floor. He unfastens her jeans and peels them down slowly, exposing her hips, her thighs. He’s surprised to discover that she’s wearing thong panties-red, with a tiny red satin bow on the front. “Look at that,” he remarks, approvingly. “Pretty sexy for a day at the office.” Not to mention very, very convenient.
“Practical,” she counters. “No panty lines.”
He kisses the bare skin of her belly just above the little bow, sliding his hands around to cup her buttocks, pulling her towards him.
“Tony, you don’t have to do that.” There’s a tremor in her voice. He’s been on the receiving end of enough of this kind of attention in public places to know how she feels-so powerful, and so exposed. Self-conscious, excited, aware of her own body in a way that only heightens the experience.
“I know.” He mouths the words into damp cotton, breathing hot against her. “I want to.”
She whimpers a little, her fingers plucking at his hair.
When he sweeps the fabric aside and presses his lips to the seam of her sex, she makes a very un-Pepper-like squeak. Her hands tighten reflexively into fists, sharp little knuckles drilling into his skull-but the pain is barely there, mere white noise amid the other clamourings of his nervous system. He runs his tongue over her.
“Ahh-!” She starts and yanks on his hair and he feels the jarring impact of her head hitting the wall behind her.
He tilts his head back and grins up at her. “Hang on to something,” he advises.
He starts off more slowly this time-a few long, lingering kisses-and keeps the movement of his mouth steady and gentle. He stays attuned to her growing need by thinking about the physics of her: the interplay of joints and muscles, electrical impulses, positive feedback leading to the exponential growth of oscillations.
“Tony,” she keens, drawing out the syllables of his name.
He starts to switch things up a little: applying his tongue, his fingers; gradually varying movement and pressure and lubrication; experimenting, all the while becoming increasingly aware of the pleasurable tension building at his own core. He blocks out everything superfluous-the cold hard tile under his knees and the buzz of the fluorescent lights and the thready beat of whatever top 40 song it is that’s playing in the bar-until all that’s left is Pepper, her movements and her noises, the salt of her skin on his lips and the flutter of her femoral pulse against his cheek.
Her approval of his methodology is evident: in fact, she’s making way too much noise, her wordless cries echoing off the tile, but it’s such a rare and wonderful thing that he can’t bring himself to tell her. Besides which, his mouth is occupied.
She tenses, draws her body upwards, quivering like a taut bowstring. Her breathing is quick and irregular. Bracing her firmly against the wall with his hands splayed over her hipbones, he hums into her. He says her name, again and again, until finally she gasps and releases, an explosion of warmth and scent flooding his mouth.
He continues to lap at her gently through the aftershocks, her hands still fisted in his hair as she rides the receding waves.
When she finally stills, he rests his damp chin on her belly and peers up into her face, his arms wrapped around her legs. She’s slumped against the wall, breathing hard: radiant, wrecked, and amazing.
“There,” he murmurs, drawing the word out. His fingers are still flirting idly with the soft skin of her thigh.
“Thank you,” she says hoarsely, her grateful tone telling him far more about her previous experience than the words themselves. He can’t help but wonder what kind of selfish jerks she’s been going out with.
“Tony.”
He realizes she’s been talking to him while he’s been staring off into space. “Huh?”
She reaches down and musses his hair. “I said, what about you?”
He smiles, licks his lips, tastes her again. “What about me?”
She dances her fingers lightly along the back of his neck. “I seem to have a lot of excess lubrication in certain areas. I thought you might want to take advantage.”
Before he can act on this tantalizing suggestion, there’s a staccato knock on the door. “Security!”
“Occupied,” Tony calls back, jumping to his feet.
“I know there’s a girl in there with you, buddy. I heard her moaning.”
Tony shoots a glance at Pepper, who covers her mouth with both hands in abject mortification. He’s dimly aware that he has the capacity to talk his way out of this, but his mind and his senses are so full of her that he can’t focus on anything else.
“I’m giving you two perverts thirty seconds before I come back with the keys.”
Pepper quickly buttons her jeans and shirt, then steps across to the toilet and lifts up the lid and seat. She beckons Tony over frantically. “Get down,” she whispers, putting both hands on his shoulders and shoving him until he drops to his knees. “Put your head in there.”
“What-”
“Just do it. Follow my lead, okay?”
He nods.
She unlocks the door and opens it, taking a step back to allow the bouncer to wedge himself into the room. He’s a guy in his mid-twenties with a shaved head and a beard, and is roughly the dimensions of a full-size fridge-Pepper has to crane her neck to look up at him.
“My friend isn’t feeling well,” she explains, in a voice that’s all softness and sweet.
She gestures to Tony, who tucks his chin against the porcelain and retches obligingly.
“I think it might be something he ate,” she adds, with just the right combination of apology and reproach. The unspoken implication is clear: I think it might be something he ate here. Then, in case he’s missed the point, she says, “You might want to let the kitchen know.”
The bouncer looks at her uncertainly. “Oh,” he says at last. “Yeah, thanks.”
“I’m sorry about all the noise.” Pepper crouches on the floor beside Tony and strokes his back reassuringly. “How are you doing?” she prompts, in a stage-whisper.
Tony gives a loud groan, clutching his stomach.
Pepper smiles engagingly up at the bouncer, and Tony can practically hear the guy’s heart melting. “I think we’re going to be a couple of minutes still.”
“Yeah, no problem. Take your time. Really. You need anything, bro?”
Tony wipes his mouth on his sleeve, and gives a half-hearted wave over his shoulder.
“I think we’ll be okay,” Pepper assures him. “Thanks so much.”
The door clicks shut, and Tony bounds to his feet and sweeps her up, crushing her to his chest. “Brilliant,” he murmurs, the word muffled by her hair. “You’re brilliant, Potts.” A surge of affection overtakes him, and he doesn’t want to let go. So he doesn’t.
He dips his head a little, and then a little more, and then he’s grinning as he kisses her, stamping his own smile onto her open mouth.
It takes her a second to respond, but then her hands move instinctively to cradle his face, pulling him insistently into the kiss. It’s slow, and playful, a teasing tangle of tongues, rather than the urgent crush of lips and teeth that he’s come to expect from her. His hands are resting lightly on her hips, fingertips grazing the cottony denim. They kiss, and kiss, and for once he doesn’t feel that pressing need to crowd her against a hard physical surface, to assure himself that she isn’t going anywhere.
Tony doesn’t kiss goodnight, because his dates don’t end at the front door if they are going well-but if he had to characterize this moment, if he had to choose a name to file it under in his mental directory, a goodnight kiss would be the closest fit. Sweet and sexy and deliciously full of promise.
They break apart-far too soon-when something rumbles against his hip. Pepper stares up at him, looking as dazed and uncertain as he feels.
She pulls the phone from her pocket and stares at it uncomprehendingly for a long moment before reporting, “Happy’s outside.”
He moves to kiss her again, but she ducks away, slipping out of his grasp to stand by the door, her fingers poised on the handle. The look she gives him is indecipherable.
Her tone is dryly sardonic, but her hand is shaking a little as she adds, “I think we’ve had enough excitement for one evening.”
Written for the Valentine's challenge at its_always_been . See master page for prompts, author's notes, and previous/subsequent chapters.
Bonus author's notes: thank you to everyone who encouraged me after the last chapter. This "sustaining a plot over several chapters" thing doesn't come naturally to me, and I appreciate your feedback.
This chapter is like, super R. Almost NC-17, but not quite, 'cause I'm a shy robot.
And yes, I borrowed the Executive Retreat from that other story I wrote where Tony and Pepper had casual sex. I don't know why the two are so inextricably linked in my mind? I guess it was just a decent plot device and I felt it deserved more play.
Also, OMFG I HAD THIS ALL CODED AND THEN LJ ATE IT. Not impressed. I have to be up at f**k o'clock tomorrow for work and I really wish the internet could do me a solid just once and let me rock out with my fic out. Damn, LJ. Damn.
5. Between Your Hips
Tony and Pepper have a Friday afternoon tradition called the Executive Retreat. At around 5:00, the CEO and CTO change into casual attire, find a relatively unpopular bar, and have a quiet drink together before going their separate ways over the weekend. It’s a chance both to decompress and to rally-neither of their jobs really stop at the closing bell.
After the way they left things on Monday, Tony isn’t sure what to expect-but at 4:45 on the nose, Pepper appears in the doorway of his office and asks when he’ll be ready to leave.
This week’s establishment is called The Lineup-which is ironic, because there certainly isn’t one. Tony jokingly calls it “Fronty’s,” because the fact that it manages to survive without any visible means of income points to its being owned by some kind of organized crime outfit. But the drinks are cheap and the atmosphere is pretty mellow, which suits their purposes just fine. Happy drops them off with a promise to be back in two hours’ time.
Tony has hardly seen Pepper all week. They’ve e-mailed every day, and they’ve participated in a couple of the same teleconferences, but their in-person contact has been limited to a couple of chance encounters in the hall-and both times, one of them was in a hurry to get somewhere, so they didn’t really talk.
It’s strange, spending so much time apart, after having her in his orbit for so long. It isn’t that Tony is averse to change-he’s what the marketing department would refer to as an early adopter-but Pepper has been one of the few constants in his life over the past decade, and without her steadying influence he feels increasingly unmoored.
She’s wearing a short-sleeved blue gingham button-down shirt, and a pair of jeans that she appears to have been lovingly stitched into. Tony’s doing his absolute level best not to ogle, but it’s been a long week, and he can’t help noticing the way her chest bounces a little as she scoots into the booth. He wasn’t intending to give her a second opportunity to shoot him down, but now he’s considering it.
Tony buys the first round. He also orders wings for them to share-largely for the pleasure of watching Pepper lick Tabasco from her fingertips, the heat flooding into her face. He teases her about the way she stows the extra wet-naps in her bag: “How much do you make a year, these days?”
She shrugs. “Force of habit.” She still doesn’t put them back.
“How was the awards night?” he asks, against his better judgement. “Did you dance?” He pictures her gliding over the dance floor in that amazing green dress, being whisked across the room by… who? Some handsome young politico looking for a photo-op? A fellow industrialist-a self-made man who admires her for her work ethic? Happy Hogan in his wrinkled monkey suit?
“No. I ended up getting cornered by Senator Stern, of all people. He decided that I really needed to hear his opinion about carbon offsets.”
“Which was?”
“I’m not sure.” Pepper grimaces. “I was tired, and he was drunk, and after a while I just stopped paying attention.”
“Be careful, Potts. That is how unplanned pregnancies happen.”
“Maybe to you,” she retorts.
Pepper buys the second round, and they lapse into a companionable silence, each lost in their own thoughts-until Pepper’s Blackberry suddenly starts juddering across the table. She gives it a surreptitious glance before tucking it into her pocket.
“Don’t mind me, boss,” says Tony, cheekily, two ounces of liquid courage burning in his chest. There is no work allowed at the Executive Retreat. In fact, it has many of the same rules as their other arrangement. Tony wonders whether the rest of Pepper’s social life is as strictly regulated.
She makes a face. “Don’t worry, I don’t.”
“That’s a pretty powerful vibrate setting.”
There’s a certain tension in her shoulders that he’s seen before, when she’s been exasperated with his come-ons. He figures she’s going to smack him in a minute.
“It has its uses,” she says, her voice low and slightly ragged. Her small fingers sweep her bangs sideways, out of her eyes; she seems transfixed by his hands, which are resting lightly on the table. He’s pleased-Tony’s never been particularly modest about his dark good looks, but his hands have always been one of his secret vanities.
“I’d love to hear about them.”
“I’m sure you would.” Her gaze flicks up to his face. She takes a sip of her gin and tonic, her mouth pursing around the straw in a way that makes him have to shift in his seat.
He knows it’s dangerous, but he wants to see just how far he can push this particular line of inquiry. “Do you own any of that kind of hardware, Pepper?”
She’s silent for so long that he doesn’t think she’s going to answer. He’s already half-formed the next thing he’s going to say when she replies, “I did, but it met with a tragic demise.” She licks her lips slowly, deliberately. She’s slightly tipsy-enough to use terms like ‘tragic demise’-but not so drunk that she’s unaware of the effect she’s having on him.
“Potts, you sly minx. You wore it out?”
“Not exactly…”
“Fried the motor?”
“No, I-”
“Snapped it with the sheer strength of your-”
“Stop guessing or I’m not telling you,” she interjects.
He nods, and gestures for her to continue.
“I dropped it in the shower. The plastic cracked, and the inside got wet. I tried to air everything out, but now it makes a weird noise, and I’m afraid to use it for fear of electrocuting myself.”
He has to smile, because it’s so entirely Pepper: her compulsive thriftiness, her stubborn refusal to let go of her outdated tech-whether it’s last year’s smartphone or a waterlogged vibrator.
“I should just throw it away,” she adds, more to herself than to him.
“Wrong.” His mouth is talking, functioning independently of his brain-which is busy building a set piece for future fantasies, involving gleaming white tile and warm water trickling over fair, freckled skin. “You should let me fix it for you. Better still-I’ll build you a new one. Waterproof. Shatterproof. Soundless. With a long-life battery.”
Pepper gives him a devilish smile. “Then what would I need you for?”
Tony’s blood is thundering in his ears, desire slamming into him like a sucker punch. He counters with, “Come over tonight and I’ll show you my long-life battery.”
“No thanks,” she says briskly.
“If you’re hungry, we can get dinner first. As long as it’s not someplace with a dress code.” He indicates his own jeans and t-shirt.
“It’s not that. I just don’t relish the thought of being spotted leaving your house in the middle of the night with my shirt on inside out.”
“Just a shot in the dark here, but: don’t put your shirt on inside out?”
“I’m speaking rhetorically, Tony.”
“Okay, but… let me get this straight.” He leans forward, puts both elbows on the table, and steeples his fingers to keep his hands from fidgeting. “You’re not objecting to the proposed activity-just the potential damage to your professional reputation?”
“Correct.” Her gaze is still fixed on his hands.
“Well, rhetorically speaking, did you know that the bathrooms here are singles with locks on the doors?”
She looks perplexed for a moment, and then her colour swiftly rises, flourishing across her skin in crimson bursts, like fireworks. “I did not know that.”
“Well, don’t just take my word for it.” He grins. “We should go and collect some empirical evidence.”
“Tell you what. Why don’t you go to the men’s room and do a preliminary study, and then I’ll come along in about,” she glances at her wrist watch, “three minutes to check your results?”
Her smile is like a shot of current straight to his solar plexus. He can’t quite believe she’s actually going to go along with this. “Three minutes is a long time.”
She nods slowly. “Use it wisely.”
*
He knows what that means, or thinks he does, but Tony spends most of his three minutes pacing the length of the small room repeatedly, shoes squeaking over the linoleum. He’s in high gear, every muscle tense, his entire body coiled to spring. He ticks off the seconds in his head, wondering if she’s taken the opportunity to slip out and hail a cab.
Pepper knocks softly before pushing the door open, glancing over her shoulder as she does so. He grabs her arm at the elbow and pulls her the rest of the way inside. The moment she’s in, he shoves the door closed and locks it, herding her towards the wall until her shoulders are squared against the tile. Her eyes, hard and blazing as sapphires, never leave his face as he works his way down the front of her shirt, flicking it open button by button.
It’s the first time he’s undressed her under such a bright light-the first time he’s been able to fully appreciate the light dusting of freckles over her neck and shoulders, her decolletage. Pepper’s freckles have always been an emotional barometer: he can tell if she’s been working too hard, spending too much time indoors, by how much they’ve faded. He remembers how dark they were that day on the tarmac at Edwards, as though they’d been waiting three months for his return to make their appearance.
After dispatching the buttons, his hand skims down to the fly of her jeans. They’re fitted and faded, the denim soft and feathery, the low rise exposing her sleek abdominals, the divot of her navel. He dips his fingers lower, the heat of her radiating through the fabric.
“Mm,” she says, and surges into him, trapping his hand between them. She kisses him hard and hungrily, her open mouth grinding against his. He nibbles her lower lip; she tastes like wintergreen and juniper and he just wants to devour her whole.
Which, he reflects, is probably exactly what she needs after such a long week.
He kisses a trail down to her midriff, lowering himself until his knees are pressed to the cold floor. He unfastens her jeans and peels them down slowly, exposing her hips, her thighs. He’s surprised to discover that she’s wearing thong panties-red, with a tiny red satin bow on the front. “Look at that,” he remarks, approvingly. “Pretty sexy for a day at the office.” Not to mention very, very convenient.
“Practical,” she counters. “No panty lines.”
He kisses the bare skin of her belly just above the little bow, sliding his hands around to cup her buttocks, pulling her towards him.
“Tony, you don’t have to do that.” There’s a tremor in her voice. He’s been on the receiving end of enough of this kind of attention in public places to know how she feels-so powerful, and so exposed. Self-conscious, excited, aware of her own body in a way that only heightens the experience.
“I know.” He mouths the words into damp cotton, breathing hot against her. “I want to.”
She whimpers a little, her fingers plucking at his hair.
When he sweeps the fabric aside and presses his lips to the seam of her sex, she makes a very un-Pepper-like squeak. Her hands tighten reflexively into fists, sharp little knuckles drilling into his skull-but the pain is barely there, mere white noise amid the other clamourings of his nervous system. He runs his tongue over her.
“Ahh-!” She starts and yanks on his hair and he feels the jarring impact of her head hitting the wall behind her.
He tilts his head back and grins up at her. “Hang on to something,” he advises.
He starts off more slowly this time-a few long, lingering kisses-and keeps the movement of his mouth steady and gentle. He stays attuned to her growing need by thinking about the physics of her: the interplay of joints and muscles, electrical impulses, positive feedback leading to the exponential growth of oscillations.
“Tony,” she keens, drawing out the syllables of his name.
He starts to switch things up a little: applying his tongue, his fingers; gradually varying movement and pressure and lubrication; experimenting, all the while becoming increasingly aware of the pleasurable tension building at his own core. He blocks out everything superfluous-the cold hard tile under his knees and the buzz of the fluorescent lights and the thready beat of whatever top 40 song it is that’s playing in the bar-until all that’s left is Pepper, her movements and her noises, the salt of her skin on his lips and the flutter of her femoral pulse against his cheek.
Her approval of his methodology is evident: in fact, she’s making way too much noise, her wordless cries echoing off the tile, but it’s such a rare and wonderful thing that he can’t bring himself to tell her. Besides which, his mouth is occupied.
She tenses, draws her body upwards, quivering like a taut bowstring. Her breathing is quick and irregular. Bracing her firmly against the wall with his hands splayed over her hipbones, he hums into her. He says her name, again and again, until finally she gasps and releases, an explosion of warmth and scent flooding his mouth.
He continues to lap at her gently through the aftershocks, her hands still fisted in his hair as she rides the receding waves.
When she finally stills, he rests his damp chin on her belly and peers up into her face, his arms wrapped around her legs. She’s slumped against the wall, breathing hard: radiant, wrecked, and amazing.
“There,” he murmurs, drawing the word out. His fingers are still flirting idly with the soft skin of her thigh.
“Thank you,” she says hoarsely, her grateful tone telling him far more about her previous experience than the words themselves. He can’t help but wonder what kind of selfish jerks she’s been going out with.
“Tony.”
He realizes she’s been talking to him while he’s been staring off into space. “Huh?”
She reaches down and musses his hair. “I said, what about you?”
He smiles, licks his lips, tastes her again. “What about me?”
She dances her fingers lightly along the back of his neck. “I seem to have a lot of excess lubrication in certain areas. I thought you might want to take advantage.”
Before he can act on this tantalizing suggestion, there’s a staccato knock on the door. “Security!”
“Occupied,” Tony calls back, jumping to his feet.
“I know there’s a girl in there with you, buddy. I heard her moaning.”
Tony shoots a glance at Pepper, who covers her mouth with both hands in abject mortification. He’s dimly aware that he has the capacity to talk his way out of this, but his mind and his senses are so full of her that he can’t focus on anything else.
“I’m giving you two perverts thirty seconds before I come back with the keys.”
Pepper quickly buttons her jeans and shirt, then steps across to the toilet and lifts up the lid and seat. She beckons Tony over frantically. “Get down,” she whispers, putting both hands on his shoulders and shoving him until he drops to his knees. “Put your head in there.”
“What-”
“Just do it. Follow my lead, okay?”
He nods.
She unlocks the door and opens it, taking a step back to allow the bouncer to wedge himself into the room. He’s a guy in his mid-twenties with a shaved head and a beard, and is roughly the dimensions of a full-size fridge-Pepper has to crane her neck to look up at him.
“My friend isn’t feeling well,” she explains, in a voice that’s all softness and sweet.
She gestures to Tony, who tucks his chin against the porcelain and retches obligingly.
“I think it might be something he ate,” she adds, with just the right combination of apology and reproach. The unspoken implication is clear: I think it might be something he ate here. Then, in case he’s missed the point, she says, “You might want to let the kitchen know.”
The bouncer looks at her uncertainly. “Oh,” he says at last. “Yeah, thanks.”
“I’m sorry about all the noise.” Pepper crouches on the floor beside Tony and strokes his back reassuringly. “How are you doing?” she prompts, in a stage-whisper.
Tony gives a loud groan, clutching his stomach.
Pepper smiles engagingly up at the bouncer, and Tony can practically hear the guy’s heart melting. “I think we’re going to be a couple of minutes still.”
“Yeah, no problem. Take your time. Really. You need anything, bro?”
Tony wipes his mouth on his sleeve, and gives a half-hearted wave over his shoulder.
“I think we’ll be okay,” Pepper assures him. “Thanks so much.”
The door clicks shut, and Tony bounds to his feet and sweeps her up, crushing her to his chest. “Brilliant,” he murmurs, the word muffled by her hair. “You’re brilliant, Potts.” A surge of affection overtakes him, and he doesn’t want to let go. So he doesn’t.
He dips his head a little, and then a little more, and then he’s grinning as he kisses her, stamping his own smile onto her open mouth.
It takes her a second to respond, but then her hands move instinctively to cradle his face, pulling him insistently into the kiss. It’s slow, and playful, a teasing tangle of tongues, rather than the urgent crush of lips and teeth that he’s come to expect from her. His hands are resting lightly on her hips, fingertips grazing the cottony denim. They kiss, and kiss, and for once he doesn’t feel that pressing need to crowd her against a hard physical surface, to assure himself that she isn’t going anywhere.
Tony doesn’t kiss goodnight, because his dates don’t end at the front door if they are going well-but if he had to characterize this moment, if he had to choose a name to file it under in his mental directory, a goodnight kiss would be the closest fit. Sweet and sexy and deliciously full of promise.
They break apart-far too soon-when something rumbles against his hip. Pepper stares up at him, looking as dazed and uncertain as he feels.
She pulls the phone from her pocket and stares at it uncomprehendingly for a long moment before reporting, “Happy’s outside.”
He moves to kiss her again, but she ducks away, slipping out of his grasp to stand by the door, her fingers poised on the handle. The look she gives him is indecipherable.
Her tone is dryly sardonic, but her hand is shaking a little as she adds, “I think we’ve had enough excitement for one evening.”